


Glass Towers

by semaphore27



Series: Götterdämmerung 24/7 [8]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Norse Religion & Lore, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Avengers Tower, Boredom, Brian Banner's A+ Parenting, Christmas Music, Deaf Clint Barton, Domestic Avengers, Epic Friendship, Evil Plans, F/F, F/M, Family Fluff, Family Secrets, Gen, Gift Giving, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Intersex Loki, M/M, Magic, Magic-Users, Mind Control, Morning Sickness, Mpreg, Musical Instruments, Near Death, Odin's A+ Parenting, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Past Child Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Sexual Abuse, Pregnancy, Recovery, Revenge, Triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-21
Updated: 2018-07-09
Packaged: 2019-05-26 06:11:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 114,428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14994542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/semaphore27/pseuds/semaphore27
Summary: All his time in Avengers Tower Loki has been trying to get the team-members to see him as a friend, not an enemy. He lights on the strategy of giving each Avenger "the perfect gift"--but at what cost? There are also the matters of the mysterious book from Asgard, freedom for Loki's enslaved son, Sleipnir, the strains on his marriage, which he and Tony are trying hard to heal, and the plans he's hatching with Hela to break the Allfather's power once and for all. There's also the little matter of the ongoing magical attacks on the tower, because even when Loki swears he isn't trying to find mischief, it seems mischief still finds him.This installment takes place just after the conclusion of Xenophobia.





	1. The Importance of a Good Grandparent/Grandchild Relationship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hela hatches plots in Asgard. Loki feels grumpy in Midgard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A certain god of mischief is being contrary with his BFF, since all the names he lists are versions of the name Jesus in languages other than modern English. _Ii̱soús_ is the Anglicized spelling of the Greek word Ιησούς. John Wycliffe (who oversaw a series of _Bible_ translations into Middle English now known as _Wycliffe's Bible_ ) used the spelling Ihesus circa 1380. Iesu shows up in Early Middle English (12th century) and in Modern Welsh. In Aramic (the language a historic Jesus would have spoken) it's Yeshu (ܝܫܘܥ).
> 
> A _Julbukk_ (Norwegian) or _Julbock_ (Swedish) is the traditional straw Christmas goat that's supposed to punish naughty children. Like Loki, I was firmly convinced, as a small child, that our _Julbukk_ was broken (I wasn't _that_ good), but I cherished him anyway.

“Huginn, to me!” the Allfather called, but the great inky bird remained on Hela’s gloved fist, mesmerized as she brought him to her breast and caressed his soot-black head with her slender fingers. After a moment, his brother Muninn came to land on her shoulder, stroking his obsidian beak through the loops and whorls and elaborate plaits of her hair.

The handmaidens she’d been given as her own had become increasingly complicated in their designs, petting Hela as if she was a child, exclaiming over her long, preternaturally soft tresses as they braided and twisted and pinned. The attention both amused and bemused her (she'd become fat more accustomed, in her ordinary life, hearing one or the other of her parents shout, "Hela, where _is_ your hairbrush?" five minutes before she'd be late for school). She was fond of them, her maidens. Pretty, soft, foolish ones with their velvet hands and flower-petal gowns. Any one of them would have died to protect her, without thought, and Hela almost feared to ask herself if that was her own doing, or the way they naturally inclined.

She was unused to getting her way so easily, when at home even little Fen looked at her askance if she tried to influence his thoughts, and would give her a solid, “No way!” That had actually been one of the phrases he’d first learned to speak, soon after "Santa Dad" (an example of Fen bathtime humour), “I love you” and “more, please?”

Her dad, Tony, mortal and unmagical though he might be, would momentarily set aside whatever currently occupied him to ask, “What the actual hell, Empress?” Jöri looked at her with knowing disappointment, whilst _Pabbi_ would say something poetical and strange, then generally block her abilities outright until bedtime. Even Uncle Thor, because he’d changed greatly since he left Asgard, would blink his bright blue eyes at her and inquire, “Is not what you attempt forbidden unto you, small princess?”

Hela loved in her family their ability to deny her, an ability that made her feel safe. She had been forbidden, absolutely, from using magic of any sort on friends, employees, delivery drivers, or anyone else in the tower, up to and including the Avengers, on pain of losing her abilities until she was eighteen (by chronological age, no less, rather than biological).

 _Pabbi’s_ eyes had gone fire-green when he told her, and he’d said, “I threaten you not, belovéd Hela. Indeed, I promise you, it shall be as I say.”

He could do it, too, making use of the immense magic that dwelt inside his damaged body.

He could do it, and he would bleed, and she would feel horrible to the depths of her soul for ever having hurt him.

Hela promised herself she would never but, knowing herself, she feared that someday she would. Exceptions to the rule would be made, naturally, for matters of self-preservation, or in defense of those who could not defend themselves—or to fend off those things that attacked under cover of darkness, that _Pabbi_ had fought alone so long, and so bravely.

He’d never known that Hela had gone to see Dr. Strange on her own (Sorcerer Supreme, her dainty white arse), as _Pabbi_ had done before her. Mr. Hogan drove, and she had given him a memory of a special Christmas choir practice (featuring all his favourite carols, which he enjoyed thoroughly), and after, a shared treat of warm apple pie with vanilla ice cream.

She’d felt guilty, but not overly so. Mr. Hogan liked her, and would store what she’d given him within his mind under the heading “Excellent Holiday Memories.” It wasn’t so much a lie as it was fiction, and _Pabbi_ made fiction all the time.

Uncle Kurt would almost certainly call that justification, and Hela knew he’d be correct. Uncle Kurt was a moral person, in the very best way, because he thoroughly examined the twistings and turnings of what was right and what was wrong, and didn’t merely pretend to look, while truly seeing only through the distorting-glass of his faith (of which she remained suspect)—not necessarily as it was practiced by Uncle Kurt, but as it was believed in by Capt. Rogers, who though a nice man, would not forgive _Pabbi,_ and of course by the Hateful People, who whined always of their own purity and their right to judge, as if hatred was a right sacredly given them.

There were people Hela would quite like to smite, in divers and sundry ways (as _Pabbi_ might say) and felt a certain gratitude that Uncle Kurt remained near, to remind her why smiting wasn’t often the best idea.

Dad, Uncle Logan and Uncle Thor often came down a little too much on the pro-smiting to be totally relied upon, and dearest _Pabbi_ … Dearest _Pabbi_ wasn’t well, and she ought not to ask him difficult things until he became strong again.

Hela plucked a small feather from Muninn’s back, hid a message within its barbs and sent it fluttering. To Midgard. To _Pabbi_. With her love.

And the all-seeing Allfather never noticed.

Hela reminded herself of the need to take _Pabbi’s_ cautions seriously. He wanted the best for her, always, and had learned his own difficult lessons about the drawbacks of a thorough mindthrall. As _Pabbi_ was also her hero, the thought of disappointing him made her cringe.

Dearest, dearest _Pabbi_. She hoped he fared well. Did he know about the new baby yet? When Heimdall had taken her from home, it had not yet even kindled.

This world was strange, Hela considered. Stranger than Midgard, in its way. Midgard's oddness lay in the way that every place one went, every person one met remained so very, very different from the next place or person. Asgard's strangeness was the opposite: it showed such conformity in every great or small thing, even the people matching in their thoughts, needs, wants, actions… Was that the Allfather’s influence? she wondered. Did he use his craft to enthrall them, perhaps even without knowing?

Hela had quickly realized her grandfather, by any way of measuring, could well be described as more than a bit mad. He was also (to list just a few of his excellent qualities), a selfish, egotistical, control-freakish, sadistical turd, intoxicated by his own power.

For now, though, Hela smiled sweetly, pretty as a picture, as they said on Midgard.

Here in Asgard, she’d set aside her much-loved inky raiment for childish gowns in what her dad would almost certainly have referred to, snidely, as “Easter colors.”

If he’d seen her now, in a yellow frock embroidered with nosegays of complimentary hues, he’d probably have said, “Don't look now, Empress, but I think the Easter Bunny threw up on your dress.”

She missed her dad bitterly, though he’d been his worst self when she left. She missed her _Pabbi_ as if the heart had been torn out from her breast. She loved him almost unbearably, and feared for him. No wonder she crept away to Sleipnir (his boyish form now enrobed in a glamour that made him look "horsey," as if nothing had changed), night after night in this mad place. Only Sleip remained to her of family, love, sanity… All that mattered in Hela's world.

She fed, now, each of the ravens a tidbit of meat, crooning to them, “Pretty birds, pretty birds, oh my pretty birds.”

“Your voice is dulcet, granddaughter,” the old monster said, his tone indulgent, “But they are not pretty birds. They are my Thought and Memory, my eyes and ears, as you know.”

“Yes, Grandfather,” Hela replied, smiling adorably. _They are also thoroughly enthralled to me,_ she thought, hiding her mind carefully under notions of childish, foolish things. She climbed toward him up the long golden stairs, stretching out her arms so that the ravens flew to Odin’s shoulders.

He’d had a small chair placed for her, close by his throne, but Hela climbed up onto the throne itself, as her grandfather liked, and perched upon the arm. She had made her pale skin pinker than was its wont, and her eyes a clear summer blue, so that the old god would see Thor’s eyes, or Baldr’s, when she looked at him, and not the rage and hurt trapped behind his stolen son’s emerald irises.

The ravens told the Allfather tales of Muspelheimr, and of the Vanir, but nothing at all of the visitor who had drunk wine and eaten cakes with Hela throughout the last night, the two of them alone in her rooms.

Hela had liked her very much. The two of them were, she'd found, far more alike than they were different, and they had chatted and laughed easily. The dead side of her visitor's face wasn't really so horrifying as one might have expected, and the living side glowed with life. The visiting queen who shared her name had been glad to promise aid in a just cause. She enjoyed the telling of Hela and _Pabbi's_ plans.

"Simple and elegant, dear child," she declared, then bit down upon a delicate white cake. She'd removed her branching headdress and her black, curling hair hung loose about her shoulders, long and silken as Hela's own.

"And ever so amusing. How far do you think you will carry it, darling? Until the end?"

"That, I have not decided, Great One--but it may be that I shall."

"Even so far as that?" Queen Hela nodded. "Whatever you decide, sweet child, I do believe this plan shall go well, and I grant the boon of my unconditional support. By the name we share..." The living side of her mouth curved in a smile, as her dead eye reflected the candlelight, silver-orange, as in a mirror.

"So shall it be." Hela rose, bending low, right hand pressed over her heart. "My loyalty always, most-beloved queen. And there will be no Valhalla?"

"Its gates are closed to him," her visitor agreed. "Now, how are these little pink cakes? As scrumptious as all the rest? One cannot find good pastry in my Realm, however one tries. Do you think it might be the humidity?"

"The green are my favorites," Hela said, with her best and brightest smile.

"Look at you, charming me!" Queen Hela exclaimed, dusting sugar from her green-gloved fingers. "Which makes me recall, I've brought a small something from my Realm, as a token of faith, and to make us good friends always."

* * *

Loki found the bag almost the moment he stepped onto the terrace, a simple pouch of black leather, clearly constructed in haste, yet somehow far more stylish than it needed to be for its purpose. That, and the inky colour, spoke to him of his Hela, and Loki had to firmly suppress a cry, he missed her in that moment so painfully, and so deeply.

How could he have been so reckless, and set his belovéd girl to this task? Their plan could only be seen as hideously dangerous, and if Odin were to discover…?

 _He will not_ , Loki chided himself. _He will not_.

His dearest girl, he reminded himself, never failed to be both remarkably devious and unexpectedly dangerous, and though he wished the mission could fall to him alone, both out of worry for his daughter and for his own satisfaction, Loki knew this was not his time, that his own skills were not the ones required in this case, whereas Hela’s were uniquely suited for their ends. Above that, she was not alone, as he would have been, entirely.

Painful as he found it to bend, Loki stooped to retrieve the pouch, his fingertips detecting Hela’s Craft in the very leather. The straps had been cut long, made to encompass a small dragon. Clearly, when he returned home on the eve of the Solstice, the first day of _Jul_ , the _Dagur Mæðra_ or Day of Mothers, they had slipped free in the moment Jöri changed once more to a little boy. So glad had he been to be back, he had not thought twice about the burden he carried.

Loki, too, had fallen out of his accustomed habits, and had not been out in the air since then, the temperature so cold these days that it hurt him. He now understood full well the hats, gloves, scarves Tony bundled the children in each winter's day, and yet he never seemed able to remember them for his own use, though they had become equally necessary for his comfort.

This Christmas Eve, as Tony called it, the outdoors seemed more bitterly cold than ever, wind whipping around the heights of the tower, the silvery sky shimmering overhead, threatening snow. Loki’s breath steamed in the air, and his bare feet burned intensely. Though he disliked wearing shoes indoors, he wished he had thought to put on warm socks, at least. He hated the aching of his battered bones beneath his skin. When would he ever feel whole again?

He hated to be so… Mortal, he supposed, was the word he sought. He longed to have adventures again—even merely to go out into the brightly lighted shops with Pepper, to run in the park, make passionate love with Tony, romp with his boys, play at sword-fighting with Kurt, wrestle with Thor. He had not so much as been allowed, the previous day, to change the silver and gold decorations of _Jul_ to the Christmas reds and greens, and had pouted slightly about his exclusion.

To amuse him, Thor had brought him a goat made of straw and bound with red ribbons. Loki looked at it from several angles. “I thought Christmas was meant to be all Santa Claus and the birth of the Christian man-god.”

“Could you just once say the name ‘Jesus’?” Kurt laughed, shaking his head, from the ceiling, where he was replacing the silver star of _Jul_ atop the tree with a tall red spire, which sported bells dangling from its sides, and had belonged to Tony’s mother, Maria. “Just once? For me? As a favour?”

Loki left off contemplating what a pretty name Maria was, soft and sweet on his tongue. Howard was an ugly name, however. It sounded stupid and obstinate, just as Howard with his heavy, dull name, and Maria with her pretty one, must truly have been, for they had not loved Tony according to his deserving, and so had injured him in divers ways. He would never understand why people made children together, only to despise them.

 _“Ii̱soús_ ,” Loki replied to his dear friend, to be difficult, perhaps to make his friend laugh again, for he found delight in Kurt's laughter. “Or do you prefer _Ihesus_? _Iesu?_? _Yeshu _?”__

Behind him, Logan snickered.

“The straw goat is a _Jul_ thing of the Northmen, a Julbukk, or Julbock, they call it,” Thor informed him. “It is meant to represent one of the two goats Tanngrisnir and Tanngnjóstr. that pull my cart across the heavens, causing the thunder.”

“I recall you attempted to harness Adelheid to a small wagon once,” Loki said doubtfully, “And that she kicked you most mightily."

Thor laughed. “If children are naughty,” he said, pulling a comical face at Jöri, “This one will come to life and butt them with his horns.”

Loki studied the straw goat as best he could without extending his _seiðr_.

“Thor, my brother,” he said doubtfully at last, “I believe this one may be broken, and will not do as you say. But as it comes from you and is a thing of great charm, I will cherish it.”

Thor had put his arms around him, not too tight for once, and held him. Loki felt grateful, although he did not like to admit, not even to Kurt, Tony or anyone, the pains of the last month, indeed of the last years, bore hard on him, and he felt far from healed in spirit, mind or body. He felt so weary always, and too often as if no good could come of anything.

In time he turned his face against Thor’s chest, taking peace from his brother’s strength, from his closeness and unaccustomed gentleness.

Perhaps he even slept then, for when he looked again the penthouse was shining. For some reason the beauty of it made him want to weep, though he did not, lest his tears be misunderstood. In truth, he did not understand them in himself. What cause had he for weeping?

 _Everything,_ said a distant voice in his head. _Everything that has befallen you_. But those were foolish words, and he would pay them no heed.

“My family, my friends,” he said. “My thanks, for you have brought to our home surpassing beauty.”

“Glad you like,” Tony said, coming round behind him and kissing the top of Loki’s head. “Did you have a nice sleep?”

“I only rested,” Loki said, with dignity, and Tony had laughed, kissed him again—properly this time—and gone off to one of his Meetings of Excessive Drinking.

Tony did not much care for the Big Book he had been given to read. He said it must not have been intended for a cynical bastard like himself. He did not greatly enjoy the meetings, either, as he cared not much to listen to the sorrows of those he did not know. He jested also that he would not believe in a higher power, unless it was Loki the Norse god of mischief.

“I am not a god,” Loki reminded him. “I am nothing.”

“You are, in fact, my own personal god, babe,” Tony disagreed, “I believe in you wholeheartedly and worship you always.”

It was a very sweet thing to say, but Loki did not feel godlike in the least. Sometimes he found it difficult, even, to get out of bed, and what sort of god had such feelings? The god of sluggards and dullards and sloth?

Hank had given him divers stern lectures, and was being very strict with him, and would not allow him to do anything interesting.

Magic, of any sort, for any reason whatsoever, was strictly forbidden. He was required to rest a great deal, he must eat no less than six small, properly nutritious meals a day. He might play his piano a little, quietly, paint or write a little (also quietly), if he wished (though not until his hands hurt). He was also allowed to read. For his _Jul_ gift, Kurt and Logan had presented him with a large stack of books with intriguing titles, many of them in the science fiction and fantasy genres Kurt favoured, and also a few by men called Ernest Hemingway and Jack London, whose works Logan enjoyed. He might watch films and programmes upon the television, if they were not overly exciting. He was allowed to have visitors if they were friendly and kind (if they were not kind to him, Logan had threatened to cut off their noses with his formidable claws, and Loki was not entirely certain whether or not his dear friend had been joking).

The boys, under no circumstances, were to climb on him, neither was he to lift them, and he and Tony were not allowed to be intimate until he was well. Even when he had suggested some things he could do to Tony that his husband would no doubt very much enjoy, and would not hurt him at all, Hank had just said, “No!” rather crossly, and soon after left the room.

Loki had found it humourous at first, but after it had struck him that he had forgotten himself, and that Hank, who was normally so kind, had been repelled by his _ergi_ ways, especially in regard to bedchamber matters.

After Hank had gone he went off by himself to one of his secret places in the tower where Tony could not see. He’d wept a little, and felt ashamed, only emerging when he perceived his husband’s worry.

When Tony asked him what was wrong, Loki gave his usual excuse, that he had become emotional because of the pregnancy. It was lovely when Tony held him, stroking his hair, but Loki wished sometimes he could be honest, always, about everything—his fears for Hela and Sleip, his fears that this baby, too, would slip away from him, like small Wilhelm. His terror that Tony, even without his Ghost in the Wall to goad him, would once more fall beneath the sorrows of his own life, and begin to drink again.

He knew Tony waxed tired, ofttimes, with reading in his Big Book and, already, of attending the meetings required of him, from which he came home cross and irritated. That he kept less and less patience with the strangers who surrounded him.

Loki feared, too, that Tony would soon tire of a husband who was forever weak and ailing--especially when the Sickness of Mornings (and many other inconvenient times, as well, it always seemed) began in him, who was not comely, and could not, at present, attend to his needs, even though he had spoken to Loki of what he must and must not do in words nearly as stern as Hank's.

Tony must be concerned for his line, as yet unsecured. He must be. And many a stallion grew weary of its brood mare, especially such an unsuccessful one as he, who had already cost him one heir. He must desire a son of his blood safely born, as poor Wilhelm had not been, to one day take charge of his great empire. He could not truly intend that poor Jöri, born of torture and spite, should reign after him, any more than the Allfather had intended that Loki should one day reign over Asgard.

It stung, to feel a prince in his heart, but to know in his head he was no more than an unwanted, unneeded bargaining chip. A _Jötunn_ on the Golden Throne, _Hliðskjálf_? Unthinkable! It could not be!

Even if he was  _Jötunn_  no longer, it appeared.

Loki touched the depressions in his skull where the roots of his horns had been. Though they still ached and itched, they had begun to fill in, the holes now harder to feel.

Loki sank down upon his usual chair by the firepit, which being formed of iron, nearly froze his arse.

He glared at the pit and commanded it, “Light yourself!” but of course it did not, and he knew better than to countermand Hank’s orders with his usual declaration of “I do what I want!”

No, not this time.

No, he must not.

Loki sighed aloud, and hated a great many things.

 


	2. Blame It On Bach, Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki plays the organ... and formulates a plan. Sometimes, though, he thinks his planning skills could be improved upon. Especially when they involve using (or overusing) magic. Especially overusing magic when you're not supposed to be using any magic at all.
> 
> In which Loki confirms his beliefs that morning sickness sucks, Stephen Strange is a prat (and bad dresser) and the road to Helheimr really is paved with good intentions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Beatles song " _Can’t Buy Me Love_ " by Paul McCartney was released as the "A" side of a single in March, 1964 (the "B" side was John Lennon's " _You Can't Do That_."
> 
> Bernadette Soubirous (1844–1879) was the oldest child of a poor miller from Lourdes, France who in 1858 reported a series of visions of a shining lady who called herself "The Immaculate Conception." In 1866 she joined the Sisters of Charity and spent the rest of her short life at their motherhouse at Nevers. Pope Pius XI declared her a saint in 1925. 
> 
> The keyboard piece _Prelude and Fugue in C Major (BWV 846) _, by Johann Sebastian Bach, is the first composition in the first book of Bach's collection of forty-eight preludes and fugues, _The Well-Tempered Clavier_. _"Vom Himmel hoch, da komm ich her"_ (" _From Heaven Above to Earth I Come___ ") is a Christmas hymn with words written by Martin Luther in 1534, set to a melody (also attributed to Martin Luther) that first appeared in 1539.
> 
> According to Marvel canon, Doctor Strange, actually was born in Philadelphia and raised in Nebraska.
> 
>  _Hungry Hungry Hippos_ is a Milton Bradley game for 2-4 players introduced in 1978. Each side of the board has a 3D hippo with a lever on its back. Pressing the lever opens the hippo's mouth, allowing it to capture marbles. At the end of the game, she who has the most marbles wins.
> 
> Veruca Salt is the spoiled rich girl from _Charlie and the Chocolate Factory_ who wants everything and wants it NOW!
> 
> Palmer Candy Co. produces cheap, paraffin-heavy vaguely chocolate-esque candies, often with holiday themes.
> 
> At Dollar Tree, or The Dollar Store, everything  
> costs $1.00. Some of their products are useful and/or fun others have been known to be... well... the words "hideous" or "perplexing" could be applied. 
> 
> Aunt Susan's fudge-making technique isn't fancy (a can of condensed milk is also required), but produces a perfectly acceptable candy.
> 
> Edmund Pevensie is given Turkish Delight by the White Witch in the first Narnia book, _The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe_.

* * *

Loki felt—in fact was very much afraid—that he had miscalculated badly, perhaps as badly as he had ever managed (or, mismanaged) in all his long life. That he had, in fact, even if for the best of intentions, made a crushingly horrible mistake. That his ever-defiant motto of “I do what I want!” had once again (as it so often did) leapt up to, as Tony would doubtless say, “Bite him fiercely in the butt.”

Why ought he to be punished, though, when he had meant so well? Punish him, yes, when he meant, and did, ill. But when he acted in aid of one who had cared for him once, and been his friend? Why should punishment be levied upon him, then, when he had been good in both deed and intention?

“Um,” Tony would tell him, “Not sure it works that way, babe.”

 _How can one more small exception to the many, many rules of Hank McCoy hurt anything?_ Loki had asked himself, earlier in the evening. For one called “Beast,” Big Blue was ever remarkably unbeastlike. Some (Loki amongst them) might even term him “overcautious.”

Dear Thea Ransome had left him for the season, to attend her only daughter on her childbed. To feel her calm and cheerful presence near him in the penthouse would greatly cheered his imprisonment (not to mention that she might have been relied upon to make snacks for him whenever he desired), but Loki knew he must not be selfish. Dear Mrs. Rosenblum, in Thea's absence, did admirable work in keeping Loki fed, but she had, of course a business to run, and their visits must, of necessity, be brief. He took great joy in his sons, but two young and active boys could not always sit still and quiet with him. Friends and family visited, but always went away again, which somehow left Loki feeling lonelier than before.

Surely Hank had somehow failed to understand that to stay at home always, often entirely on his own, and to constantly behave oneself quickly moved beyond the realm of the tedious to become nearly maddening, and to feel mad with boredom certainly could not be healthy, could it?

Such thinking, inevitably, led to justification: _surely, just a little will not hurt, and if that little proves harmless, then perhaps just a small amount more...?_

After all, Loki also told himself, his Christmas gift to Clint, that his recent friend should hear with a sharpness equal to his remarkably keen vision, with no need to rely upon the aids of hearing Tony had manufactured, and Steven (to Clint's extreme displeasure) had forced him to wear in training and upon missions, had turned out remarkably well. The gift had cost Loki no more than a slight dribbling of blood, quickly staunched, and brought his friend great joy, just as a gift ought to.

He found further justification in his almost painful desire to do good. Truly, truly to do good. Like Agent Romanov, he badly wanted to expunge the red ill deeds from his personal slate.

With all this in mind, Loki considered the vast dimensions of sadness that lived within Steven, beneath the mask of his heroic exterior. Steven, his once-friend, who was now merely kind to him--extremely kind, it was true, but Steven, once, had known a brother's love for him, and now loved him not. The bridge of his love had broken, as such bridges did--as the Bifrost had, and cast him out into the abyss where all darkness dwelt.

“’Can’t buy me love,’ Lok,” Tony would undoubtedly quote at him, but Loki’s intentions truly lay not in that direction. He only cared that Steven not be lonely, that he know a measure of happiness at this turning of the year.

Loki knew the fearfulness of living as a man out of time. He knew what it meant when all one’s friends had taken their last journey, that sensation of floating on a sea of nothing, unable to touch, or be touched.

At least, amidst all other losses, Loki had Thor, his brother, who knew him always, from this time to the next.

Well, Steven had a brother, too. A Shield-Brother. Loki had heard of him, at length, in the time long past, down by the river, in that bubble of stillness he and Steven shared in the midst of a war. No more Steven’s brother of blood than Thor was Loki’s, but his brother nonetheless.

James Buchanan Barnes, was the name of Steven's Shield-Brother, called “Bucky” by those who cared for him most. In more recent times given a colder name: Winter Soldier.

Because it was Jultide, because it was Christmas, Loki wished, with the whole of his heart, to gift his once Shield-Brother with something only he had it in his power to give. He only hadn’t known what that something might be—until he’d been sitting side-by-side with his own dearest friend in the front pew of St. Bernadette Soubirous, preparing to play for Kurt, and Kurt's fellow congregants, Bach’s “ _Prelude and Fugue in C major_ ,” and also “ _Vom Himmel hoch, da komm ich her_ ” upon the church’s lovely (and lately restored, by him) antique organ, as Kurt’s priest of the man-god, Father Jerome, had asked of him, and Hank, after much persuasion, had granted special permission to do.

Loki had been happy to grant the favour, both as a small gift to his beloved Kurt himself, and because the thought of being allowed even a brief reprieve from his imprisonment, if only for the space of time filled by a midnight mass, filled him with something approaching ecstasy.

Also, Father Jerome had been kind and gentle to him, from the month of October when the first met, until the present time, and never seemed to care in the least that Loki was (in the terms of Fr. Jerome's religion) a discredited pagan deity, worshiped by none.

Kurt had instructed him merely to say, “I am not a Catholic,” if the subject arose, but Loki thought it best to be truthful.

The perfect beauty of the idea developed fully as Loki played, the joy of giving Steven happiness echoed in the joyous music. Loki could feel, close to, as music caught the lost one's attention, the pages of his mind opening fully as he began to listen in bewildered wonder.

Loki realized, then, for the first time since he had become aware of the secluded man's presence, exactly who his listener must be.

Close, oh, so close, that to reach him would be nothing…

To act, upon the tumultuous ecstatic shout of the final note, had been a moment of purest impulse (in both senses of the word), not planned, not thought through. Blame it upon Hel-bedamned Bach and his Hel-bedamned inspiring music, if anyone was to be blamed for the events that followed.

Steven _never_ would have found what he sought, not within a million years. He knew not of St. Bernadette Soubirous, or that that particular place of worship concealed a secret room, or that the secret room now and then served as a refuge for unfortunates (often mutants) who were sought by officials of the law. Loki was also not meant to be aware of these things, and yet _had_ become aware of them, along with--at that last fortuitous moment--the identity of he who dwelt within the room.

Having discovered all this (after just having played so wonderfully well upon the organ) and--as the Midgardian saying went, "grabbed the bull by the horns"--Loki felt marvelously pleased with himself, and quite extremely clever.

He managed to secure the gift quickly, in perfect order, notified Kurt inside his mind that he would not be returning to sit beside him, but that Kurt ought to stay and enjoy the remainder of the ritual. He made a gentle teleport home with the gift still in his arms, brought it in to the prepared place and left all as needed for its comfort and content, but now…

Now the bottom of all things had fallen away and Loki was left, once more, pinwheeling, plummeting through space.

Not literally, of course, but as a figure of expression.

In literal terms, he lay upon the scratchy red carpeting of the lift that ought to have been taking him safely home to the penthouse, where he might surreptitiously have a quick shower as clean-up, then fall into bed, well-satisfied with his night’s work, answering Tony’s mumbled, “How’d it go, babe?” with a smug, “I am quite talented,” before he snuggled into Tony’s warm, sleepy arms.

If he could stand. If his body did not feel as if he weighed as much as twenty-seven Volstaggs, with his nose gushing blood, his eyes tearing madly (perhaps with more blood), and his stomach about to explode.

Christmas, Loki decided, was clearly too dangerous a festival for such as himself. Entirely too dangerous.

To begin with, beyond the impulse to do dangerous amounts of good, as one was constantly exhorted, there were the films—people jumping from bridges, their lives torn away until they became invisible to all they loved, and all who loved them. How could such a thing be called _It’s a Wonderful Life_ , except in the bitterest irony? And that Grinch-Creature, with his sly, cruel face and abused, sad-hearted dog—such was a subject for nightmares, not for children.

Loki trusted not that Grinch, even after the supposed happy ending, though his family found the creature quite amusing.

 _Is that what Midgardians see when they look upon me?_ he wondered. _A sly green creature bound to steal their joy?_

After viewing the film with his loved ones, Loki had retired (in truth, slunk off) to the bedchamber and wept bitter tears, shielding his emotions strenuously so that they would not spill over into the common room. When Tony came in later, he pretended to be asleep, but his husband had given his bum a light slap, bent down and whispered in his ear, “Hey, should I check the closet and under the bed for Grinches, babe?”

It had only made Loki weep more. He did not enjoy to be teased, especially at this time, with his emotions all in a cacophany with the chemicals of pregnancy surging within him. He also did not enjoy to be made to feel foolish, neither did he wish to be comforted, nor wish to be afraid.

He did wish to ask the question of Tony of how he was, in truth, perceived by those around him, but his once-pure trust in his husband, while stronger than it had been in many weeks, had not yet entirely been restored, and he half-feared that Tony's answer might wound him, when he had not yet the strength to bear that hurt.

Eventually, Tony retreated to the room of requirement to make calls upon his mobile, while Loki wept until he was sick into the bedside bin and had to magic it clean again, using his Craft in a tiny defiance of instructions, though at least he did not bleed to reveal his deceit.

At shortly past eleven, by the clock, Kurt bamfed in. Loki heard the rush and whoosh of the act in the penthouse common area, and smelled the bitter-sourness of sulfur.

“Lo?” Kurt called softly. “Lo, you’re in here? You’re not ready?”

Loki had forgotten. Forgotten in a way beyond forgetting. As if the plans had never been. His brain had, by all measures, entirely turned to porridge and treacle.

He had specifically told Kurt he _did_ wish to accompany him to observe the Mass of Midnight at St. Bernadette Soubirous and, as requested, to play upon the organ. The place of worship was mutant-friendly, Kurt’s home parish, and Kurt had brought him there some weeks past, not to attend one of the Christian man-god’s ceremonies, but because the organ ailed, could not be used until repaired, and no one could be found to heal it.

Kurt thought perhaps Loki might be able. It had been his craft, after all--or one of them--along with his paintings, his museum restorations, and his work for the government, back in those elder days with Myrddin.

He loved greatly to heal instruments of music, to make their broken voices strong and true again. On that first visit, he’d sat in a pew while he waited for Kurt to stop speaking with the priest, examining things around the sanctuary: the dim red light meant to indicate the man-god was present, but was really a candle in a red holder; the tall windows with their jeweled colors, and the quality of the afternoon light as it shone through them; the dark wood of the pew-back before him, polished over time by the touches of thousands.

It was a good place, perhaps, and Loki understood why Kurt loved it, but for him the church was merely another place where he felt foreign and alone.

He did not like to look upon the crucifix, for the position of the Christus reminded him painfully of that time in which he hung alone within his cruel suit of armor in Castle Doom, and only the voices of his dear children sustained him.

To avoid those painted eyes, Loki made his way to the organ in its loft. He worked its stops and its pedals tenderly, touching the keys with gentle hands. The organ was very beautiful, in the way of well-made antique things. It wheezed and groaned a bit, but could easily be made sound once more, with skill and care.

He played a little longer, to learn the organ's ways, to let it sing to him its stories and its secrets.

One secret in particular intrigued him. As the organ played it created echoes, maps of the sanctuary and beyond, of all the church's hidden spaces.

Behind the great instrument, unknown to most, lay the small, hidden room, furnished with a bed, a washstand, a light and a few other simple things. Within that room dwelt a strange man, older than he ought to be, as Steven Rogers was older.

A man with a limb of iron.

A man with two minds, one locked tight inside the other.

The presence of that man, Loki thought, bore pondering.

Each time he returned to St. Bernadette Soubirous, in each stage of his repairs, Loki carefully scryed the boundaries of that room, making certain the man yet lingered.

Loki found that he did.

He made no plans, only, throughout the weeks, remained curious.

He ought to have known (knowing himself), that in the end he’d be bound to do something foolish.

 

Loki lay on the lift floor and groaned. The dark-red carpet felt itchy beneath his cheek, and smelt somewhat of dust, but he could not lift his head. His stomach roiled and he could not seem to catch his breath.

He prayed, in disconnected fashion, to the _Nornir_ , “Oh, please, wise sisters no. Oh, please, I beg of you, I deserve not to live, but cut not his thread. Do not destroy us utterly. Cut not again the thread of our child.”

Loki knew, inevitably, that he would be sick, but fought the urge with desperation. He did not wish to foul Tony’s lift. He also wished, devoutly, that the _verdammt_ machine would be still, and hang motionless in its shaft. The constant jerking from floor to floor, brought about by inconsistent surges of energy from his greatly over-strained _seiðr_ , which always _would_ bedevil the electrics, only heightened his nausea.

And then, outside the tower where he lay, a malign _something_ moved with oily grace, wrapping all the great tower's height like a dark gift with its sinuous shadow.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, not now!” Loki exploded, gathering up all that errant, lift-jerking magic in a ball and flinging it at the creature, perhaps with even more force than intended.

The beast exploded satisfactorily, drifting in petals of black confetti to the snowy pavements below.

“Strange, you cretin!” Loki shouted into the night. “Will you now not act in our aid? Amongst these Avengers are those you call colleagues. My might, as you must see, is at lowest ebb. What becomes of them all when I can no longer defend?”

The Sorcerer Supreme (as always, the title alone caused Loki’s lip to curl) appeared before him in nebulous form. He possessed ludicrously glossy black hair—which he no doubt coloured to cover all but the two "distinguished" patches of grey at his temples (Tony also coloured his, but Loki did not fault him--they were each allowed their small vanities). He wore a full red cloak of many parts sewn into one, with a ridiculous collar which did not suit him at all, but made him somewhat resemble a circus strongman.

He ought to wear a leotard underneath, such as Kurt had worn in the circus.

Perhaps he did.

Strange looked, Loki considered, an utter twat.

His stomach convulsed suddenly and violently, and he threw up, without _actually_ meaning to, upon Strange’s shining, ephemeral boots.

“You ail, Loki of Asgard,” the Sorcerer Supreme intoned.

Loki fell back, groaning. “Why is not ‘Loki’ sufficient onto you? Or if you must, ‘Loki Stark’, for I know full well you were born in Philadelphia and raised in Nebraska, and those of Philadelphia and Nebraska speak not so.”

Strange at least had the decency to look slightly shamed. He also cleaned the carpeting.

“I thank you, Doctor Strange.” Loki told him, in a more measured tone. “Both for that, and for coming to me here. Happy Christmas to you, and to all you hold dear.”

“You have changed, Loki… er… Stark,” the sorcerer observed thoughtfully. “I observe new strength and purpose within you.”

“Here, I am loved,” Loki answered simply, “I have value. And I would defend my family, along with the Shield-Brothers and Shield-Sister of my husband. For myself, I would do so even with my life, but I cannot barter in this way with the life of my unborn, and for this reason I call upon you. For is it not your duty to defend this Realm, and this city in particular, from that which is malign and magical?”

“It is,” Strange answered, “Yet I watched to see how you fared, and have observed you do well, your great abilities unused for cruel or selfish ends. I believe now, Loki, the change in you to be genuine. You not only are loved, but you love in return.”

“So much, Doctor,” Loki said, his eyes leaking. “So very much.”

“I will aid you,” the Sorcerer Supreme announced regally, as if granting a royal boon, then vanished into a circle of gold and crimson light.

Loki kept his further thoughts to himself.

Eventually, with nearly the last of his strength, he managed to force the lift upward.

 

Tony found him several hours later, lying just across the penthouse threshold.

Loki was thankful he had remembered, before consciousness left him altogether, and with it his last crumb of magic, to exchange his soiled clothes for his new Christmas Eve pyjamas—then noticed he’d bled all over them as well.

His husband stared down upon him, frowning, the two boys peeping out from behind his hips.

“Let me guess,” Tony said, “You decided to protect us from the extreme dangers of under-door drafts by flinging yourself bodily across the crack?”

“I heard a noise,” Loki said, not having to work in the least to sound weak and confused.

“ _Pabbi_ ,” Jöri chided, “When you hear a noise on Christmas Eve, it’s Santa. You mustn’t check. What if you interrupt him at his work?”

“I tripped, Tony,” Loki said, “I know not on what.”

Tony’s brows rose. His look was mildly skeptical—until he noticed his own leather jacket (by serendipity, where Loki was concerned) at the bottom of the coat-closet doors, sleeves reaching out threateningly into the corridor. Loki had not even arranged the garment in that manner. Tony clearly left it that way, and knew in an instant he had done so.

“Oh, Lok,” he said softly. “Of all the stupid… I’m so… God, babe, I’m so sorry! What a way to start Christmas, huh?”

“All is well, belovéds,” Loki said serenely. All in an instant he felt oddly at peace, yet at the same time entirely physically wretched, with that draining comprehensive nausea he knew meant he had tumbled all at once, in earnest, into the sickness of morning.

“Fen, buddy,” Tony said, “Jöri, my man, you guys go down as fast as you can to Uncle Thor’s and wake him up. Yell ‘Merry Christmas!’ really loud at him, okay? And tell him he needs to get up here, pronto, and cook us breakfast, because we’re hungry, hungry hippos.”

The children ran off, sounding more, in truth, like a thunder of hippopotami than like two small boys.

“I see through your subterfuge,” Loki told his husband, with as much feigned scorn as he could muster. “I need not my brother to lift me like a child.”

“Okay,” Tony answered, “Hmm. How ‘bout my arm? Would you accept my arm?”

Loki considered. “That I believe I would accept gladly, _hjarta hjarta minn_.” Only Loki discovered he could not lift himself at all, not even the slightest fragment of an inch, and Tony’s attempt to raise Loki's head and shoulders from the floor to even so far as his lap sent a wing of violet darkness swooping down over him.

It was the last of Christmas Day he properly remembered, which may, from what he heard after, actually have been for the best.

* * *

Bruce had to admit to being caught off-guard when Loki opened the penthouse door on the day after Christmas, and not Tony, who he’d expected.

“Uh…” he said. "Um, hi Loki."

Bruce (with full acknowledgement of the fact that he'd behaved with extreme crappiness toward his best friend's husband for months) still had to gear himself up a little bit for actual one-on-one time with Loki. Part of that was no more than pure shame on his part, for which no number of apologies felt quite sufficient. The other part was that any conversation with Loki was going to feel like having been dropped into the middle of a Shakespeare play without having learned your lines-- awkward, to say the least.

Also, at the moment, Loki didn't look like he should be anywhere but in bed, because he was moving like someone at least 116 years old. Which--it hit Bruce--actually fell far short of his actual age. Maybe 116 dog years. Which probably still fell short of the year of Loki's birth.

Which was probably also why Bruce, though determined not to repeat his earlier misdeeds, didn't exactly find it easy to chat. Loki may not have been evil, a fact Bruce found himself now perfectly willing to admit, but he still seemed so frickin'... alien.

“Um, Loki,” Bruce tried again. “Yeah. Hi again. I’m surprised to see you. Is Tony…?”

Loki gazed at him, eyes slightly too shiny, then glanced away fast, just for a moment. When he looked back at Bruce again, a pleasant-appearing smile was pasted firmly in place.

“Hi, Bruce,” he said softly. “Please come in?”

“Uh, sure.”

Even to Bruce’s own ears he sounded, to use a Loki word, churlish. Or, as normal people might say, kind of rude. He hadn't meant to sound that way, only the previous night Loki had been so far down for the count, Hank McCoy actually had to pick him up like an infant and haul  him off to bed.

Besides, honestly, he’d expected Tony to be right there, mostly owing to the fact that he’d received a text saying, “BRO! WAITING!” not half a minute before.

Knowing Tony, he’d sent the text, decided last second that he needed to pee, and dragged his poor, sick husband out of bed to play doorman for his incoming guest.

And wasn’t Loki basically on bed rest? Tony might be, in a lot of ways (and he freely admitted it himself), a grown-up, genderswapped Veruca Salt, but was even he that much of an idiot? Did they need to have a discussion?

“I am allowed up for short periods,” Loki said. He stepped back with about a tenth of his usual athletic, my-feet-do-not-quite-touch-the-floor grace, which still left him as one of the most graceful people Bruce had ever encountered. Even those couple steps made him look like he was demonstrating a small piece of an old and courtly dance.

Bruce kind of felt like he should bow.

“Entirely unnecessary,” Loki told him, deadpan.

“I could kneel,” Bruce suggested.

“Not funny.” Loki’s head ducked and he stared down at his bare, white feet. He had the most damn perfect toes Bruce had ever seen. They went well with his gently curved white-marble arches and the architectural perfection of his ankles. Bruce didn’t even have a thing for feet, but Loki’s were just ridiculous.

The sometime-god was also dressed in black head-to-toe (in contrast to Bruce’s crumpled Rugby shirt and chemical-stained jeans), in legging-like pants and a tunicy sweater, the whole look unadorned in any way except for Loki's wedding ring. The color alone should have made him look silly, coupled with his pale, pale skin—fair game for numerous mime jokes.

Not to mention… Leggings? Tunicy sweater?

That Loki would almost certainly call the sweater a “jumper” should have added to the fun.

Only it didn’t. Instead, he looked ethereally gorgeous, a dancer combined with a super-hot  _Hamlet_ , combined with a Romantic Poet. Or maybe with one of Neil Gaiman’s Endless from the  _Sandman_ comics, if the book was having a really good artistic run.

Bruce realized, in that instant, that he was still basically (by his own doing) stuck in the doorway, almost glaring at his best friend’s husband, who, (as already noted) had removed himself by a polite distance while Bruce hovered on the threshold like an uninvited, badly-dressed vampire.

Part of his Christmas gift to Tony, Bruce had solemnly promised, was to try to be unfailingly kind to his husband. It was also going to be one of his New Year’s resolutions. That, and to get more kale into his diet.

He actually had doubts about both resolutions, but as Yoda would say, “'No. Try not. Do… or do not. There is no try.'”

Bruce harbored a sneaking suspicion the Jedi Master would be somewhat unimpressed by his efforts up to this point.

“I’m the sentient equivalent of kale?” Loki asked, with a slight tilt of his head.

“Uh…” Bruce replied intelligently.

“Honestly, Bruce, won’t you come in, please?” Loki continued. “May I get you some coffee?”

Bruce entered warily, still instinctively, foolishly distrustful of the trickster’s smile--which was, he had to admit, actually a wonderfully sweet smile, warm, completely free of guile--and probably free from malice, magic and peanuts as well, just like the box of homemade fudge Loki’d left outside his door a few days past.

He’d thought of chucking the candy straight into the trash, but had eaten it instead, in a series of weak moments. It had smelled really good, and under duress, Bruce would confess to having a major sweet tooth, especially during the holidays.

The fudge had been delicious. On a scale of one to ten, one being the mostly-wax Palmer’s crap they sold at the Dollar Tree, and ten being chocolate heaven, Loki's creation scored about a ninety-eight. The only reason it didn’t score higher was that he needed better taste buds to fully appreciate its full and awesome beauty. This was definitely not the stuff his Aunt Susan made by melting Staypuft marshmallows and Nestle’s Toll House Morsels together in the microwave, with a splash of vanilla for flavor.

A poll of his fellow Avengers told Bruce they’d all eaten theirs too (Natasha utilizing her superspy skills to also make off with half of Cap’s supply when his back was turned). In fact, they’d all kind of wondered between themselves if Loki had an additional secret stash hidden away somewhere, and had ordered Bruce to scope out the penthouse freezers while he was upstairs, if he could do so without being obvious.

Maybe the “No Magic” sticker had been an outright lie. Maybe Loki had given up on scepters with glowing blue orbs for his mind-control needs, and all this was going to end up in tears, like Edmund, the White Witch, and the enchanted Turkish Delight.

“It’s only candy,” Loki told him, almost too softly that time for Bruce to hear, except that his Hulk-enhanced hearing caught just the slightest tremble to the god’s voice.

He’d hurt Loki’s feelings.

 _Good_ , a residual mean part of him said. The not-so-mean, more-like-Bruce part felt ashamed of himself all over again, especially as he gazed at the young not-quite-man in front of him. Loki still looked bruised as hell, painfully thin, stressed, and clearly in dire health. With his head bent, Bruce could see two holes nearly the size of quarters in his frickin’ head, just above his temples and partly hidden beneath Loki’s just-starting-to-grow-out-again curls.

He looked totally, completely exhausted. Drained of life in some vital way.

“I made large quantities of the sweet with my After-School Program children at Boys and Girls Club,” Loki went on. “Enough for all our families and friends, then the extra to sell at our Winter Concert fundraiser. The building heating system is terrible, and we’d love to have it revamped. Jorge, my supervisor, also discovered that the New York Public Schools are selling a large collection of used band instruments. If we purchase those and I restore them to their original order, each child could have one of his or her own.”

Loki moved (limped painfully) to the kitchen, took a bunch of stuff from the fridge and began to artistically bring it all together on a plain-but-elegant white plate.

“You should hear them, Bruce! They’re so enthused about music now. I also hate having to see them wear their jackets indoors against the chill, especially when some of those jackets are so flimsy. I improved them as I could without the change becoming obvious, yet Jorge said I must not replace the jackets, for that would be presumptuous and insulting to their families.”

He made a final arrangement to the plate, then turned to stash away the extras, pausing to lean heavily for well more than a minute against the kitchen island.

“Adding in the proceeds of the Christmas DVD we recorded with the Manhattan Girls’ and Boys’ Choirs—which both Macy’s and Saks kindly distributed for us—we achieved three-quarters of our goal. Since the last quarter, meant for the instruments, fell into the category of education in the arts, we were able to apply for several grants, which paid for the rest.”

“Sounds like you’re really getting good at swimming those fundraising waters,” Bruce said, in order to say something. Charitable Loki confused him. The whole community service thing had started off, he expected, as a S.H.I.E.L.D. plot to piss Loki off and make him lose his temper, so they could toss his elegant, evil ass back in the slammer post-haste.

Instead, Bruce realized, Loki picked up that ball and ran with it like hell, because Loki _loved_ those kids. Loved them like each one was a personal challenge, like each would end up feeling brilliant, empowered, loved, not just in that “everyone-is-special, everyone-gets-a-trophy” way, but because Loki actually saw his or her brilliance, and wanted to feed it like a bonfire.

When he talked about the work he lighted up, until seemed to Bruce almost unbearably beautiful--except, at the same time, there he stood at the kitchen island, sweating and shaking and clearly ill.

"I am not allowed to go back to my boys and girls for some time yet," Loki murmured, like he was telling secrets to the marble countertop.

Bruce felt an idiotic urge to wrap him up in a warm blankie and feed him tea and crumpets. He had only the vaguest idea what a crumpet was, but Loki clearly needed and deserved one. Or a dozen. With extra Nutella for good behavior.

“Almost, in its way, like a cross between an American pancake and an English muffin,” Loki told him. “Although oddly sponge-textured, they’re quite tasty. I’m allergic to nuts, though, so I’ll need to have mine with marmalade instead, or possibly lemon curd. Thor made some marvelous Meyer Lemon curd, and I believe he tucked a jar of it into your stocking. Try it on toast or an English muffin, it’s really very good.”

Plate in hand, he left the kitchen, lurching behind Bruce to gently shut the front door.

Once upon a time, this would probably have made have made Bruce feel like he was trapped inside with a dangerous madman instead of sharing the company of creaky, philanthropic, alien version of Martha Stewart.

“I apologize for lying, Bruce,” Loki said after a pause. “Tony’s actually out. As you may have guessed, I’m the one who asked you here, and not my husband. I borrowed his phone to send the text, because... and please forgive me for making assumptions, but I wasn't sure if you would answer.

He paused. “Would you like that coffee?"

Something was weird, off… Bruce couldn’t quite pinpoint…

And Loki had lured him here under a pretext?

Then it hit him. “Wow, Santa must have brought you some contractions for Christmas.”

Loki’s eyes widened, pupils instantaneously spreading into black basketballs. His lips parted and his free right hand (the one not occupied with the plate) spread protectively across his belly.

Oops. Open mouth, insert foot, fool.

“Not that kind of contractions, Loki. The… um… verbal kind. ‘It’s.’ ‘They’re.’ ‘I’m.’ That sort of thing.”

“I thought you might take me seriously if I spoke like you,” the god told him, still in that subdued voice. “That I’d seem less… Ridiculous? Laughable? than I usually do. I hoped you—all of you—would feel less inclined to feel me worthy of mockery.”

Loki ducked his head again, his gaze shifting sideways. “However, should it make no difference, I shall revert to my accustomed speech. The strain is far less when I need not pay such close attention to each word.”

“Revert away,” Bruce told him, his personal sense of shame ramping up another notch. The whole situation made him think of a boy he'd known in Elementary School. What was his name? Joseph, that was it. Joseph. Joey.

Joey had a slight stammer, the kind that really only popped out when he got excited or nervous. He’d been a nice kid, the kind who’d share superhero trading cards, or Oreos from his lunchbox.

But the top choices on their classroom’s bullies list were Joey-with-the-stammer or Bruce-with-the-crazy-dad, and so…

And so something had to give…

He wasn’t a good guy like people thought, he was the same guy he’d always been, a coward filled chock-full of mammoth, crushing destructive rage.

He was Brian Banner’s son.

“Oh, Bruce,” Loki breathed, the look in his purple eyes meltingly sympathetic. “You were a child. You managed as best you could.”

“I’ll take juice, if you have it,” Bruce told Loki bitterly, though he didn’t think he could swallow a thing. Something was wrong, very weirdly wrong, with him, with the god, with everything, but he couldn't figure out what it might be.

Loki was right up next to him all of a sudden, palm pressed to Bruce’s chest, just over his heart.

“Breathe. Only breathe,” he advised, the intense warmth of his hand passing slowly through Bruce’s body, until the dangerous moment had passed him by.

“Now and then I become so angry I throw up,” Loki said, quirking a small grin. “Though other times I merely wish to subjugate a small planet. As my mood takes me.”

Loki humor. Bruce almost smiled too.

“Of course.” Loki nodded slightly. “I seek to lighten the moment. I hope the attempt does not offend?”

The god moved silently back toward the kitchen. “Will orange juice suit? We also are possessed of apple also, I believe, if that is your preference.”

“Orange is fine.” Bruce sank into the big, cushy chair perpendicular to the head of the couch and tossed out a couple coasters to protect the coffee table. They were cute coasters, the kind of thing kids all across America gave to their parents for Christmas, though better done than 99% of the others—drawings (on what looked like good paper), the kind a young child with a strong natural talent for art would make, done in colored markers and sandwiched between a sheet of fancy red and gold glass and a sheet of clear glass, flat copper strips to bind the edges.

“Pretty adorable. Who’s the artist?”

“They were presented to us by the boys for _J_ … an early Christmas present,” Loki said. “The drawings represent each member of the family, and friends.”

“They’re adorable, Loki. The one of Tony belongs in a museum. That beard is epic! They forgot to make any of us Avengers smile, though.”

“I do not recall if the boys have ever seen you smile, barring Thor—and as you see, he smiles brightly in his depiction. I hesitate to repeat Jöri’s words in this instance, but he said, ‘They look at us as if we smell bad.’ I explained, naturally, that the fault was mine, not theirs. That you who Avenge are fond of them as you are able, given their parentage.”

"Ouch," Bruce said..

Loki gave him a sideways look, an uninterpretable look, as far as Bruce was concerned.

"What?" Bruce asked.

Loki shrugged. He also, finally, set down the damn plate he’d been carrying, bending so stiffly and painfully to reach the low table, Bruce felt as if he ought to support or steady him—then realized he'd done exactly that.

The plate, he saw, held several kinds of cheese, a couple distinct kinds of crackers, and three different varieties of grapes.

“Loki, will you sit down?” Bruce asked. “Looking at you is making me nervous.”

“I shall not harm you,” Loki told him gently. “I would not.”

“That’s not what I meant.” He helped Loki lower himself to the end of the couch, close to where he was sitting. “Loki, you look awful. Are you even supposed to be out of bed? What’s going on here?”

The god turned his head, but not before Bruce had noticed his eyes brimming.

“Forgive my observation that your stomach was growling, Bruce. I thought you might appreciate a light morning repast, and I am meant to eat constantly. It is tiresome.”

“Nope, not changing the subject. What’s up?”

Loki grabbed a couple tissues. “Your juice…”

“Damn the juice,” Bruce answered, but fetched his o.j., and a glass of water that was probably Loki’s, from the kitchen, just so the god would shut up about the damn stuff already. On second thought, he also grabbed a small apple-shaped bottle of juice from the fridge, and a straw.

“Eating for two again, huh?” Bruce studied Loki’s face. “It sucked that the morning sickness kicked in so bad on Christmas Day. Thor put on a fantastic spread. Your brother really can cook up a storm.”

“He _is_ the god of thunder,” Loki deadpanned, then grimaced. “I deeply regret my failure of hospitality, and appreciate with my whole heart the consideration of all in allowing the celebration to remove to Avengers Central. I appreciate, also, that my family and friends were included in the event, when they might have been excluded. The boys admire all of you so, their small hearts might well have broken.”

Loki slumped back in the cushions, toying with his unopened straw. “I remember, after S.H.I.E.L.D., struggling once for hours to remove the wrappings from one of these. Words of great foulness came from my lips, I believe. How times have changed. Or do I mean, ‘the more things change, the more they stay the same?’ I sometimes become muddled in Tony’s proverbs.”

He pulled up his feet and arranged a couple throw pillows, allowing himself to lounge more comfortably against the arm of the couch. “Had a turkey been roasted within these walls, I surely should not have survived it. The most I remember of all Christmas Day was that the very lingering scent upon Tony’s shirt when he embraced me caused me to vomit for nearly an hour, and normally I enjoy turkey above all other meats. I am glad I improved by eventide, for though I was a regrettably bad host, I greatly enjoyed when all joined us here late in the day, for gifts and the films of Christmas. The Ghost-Muppets of Ancient Christmases was highly entertaining.”

Loki’s mangling of _The Muppet Christmas Carol_ could probably be excused by the fact that he was at least half asleep for most of it, sprawled across Tony’s lap. He’d looked absolutely trashed, too, and not in any way that was alcohol-related.

Though Loki had (weakly and confusedly) shoved him out the door with the kids for Christmas dinner, Bruce didn’t honestly think Tony enjoyed any of it. Loki was so crazy sick and got so dehydrated, Hank McCoy had to put him on an IV for most of the day. He’d nearly melted with relief when Loki texted him that he felt better, and would everyone like to come upstairs for presents and movies?

Even then, he’d been too tired to open more than a couple gifts and deliver a brief-but-impassioned rant against misogynistic bully reindeer and how “Rudolph” was a more apt name for him than perhaps Tony had known, even though he maintained his helm had beautiful, curving horns, like those of the most-charming _Jólgeit_ or, as the creature was also known, _Julbock_ his most-belovéd brother had given him this Christmas, and not ungainly branching antlers. He then passed out against his husband’s chest.

At which point, Tony turned to Hank. “What the f… uuudge did you give my honey, BB?”

The giant blue mutant simply bent down, lifted Loki bodily and hauled him off to bed, Tony following. Both men returned about ten minutes later.

“He’s fine. Sleeping like a lamb, if anyone besides Kurt, Logan and the kids care.” Tony reported, his grin just a little too sharp.

"Brother, this Tide of Christmas...?" Thor began, as gently as Thor could.

"Oh, you too, Pep. And you, Point Break. Sorry. Plus, everyone remind me, next Christmas, to make sure Capsicle keeps his perky ass in the tower? I am so not gonna spend another holiday answering, _'Where is Steven? Why is not Steven here? When will Steven arrive?_  ' with, ‘Dunno, Loki, soon.’ Swear to god. You’ll help me remember, won’t you, kids?”

“Yes, daddy,” Jöri replied absently. Thor had given him an Asgardian toy called a Thunderball, and the boy had apparently now devoted his life to trying to figure out how it worked without actually taking it apart or breaking it.

Give Tony a couple more years, he’d fix that little habit.

Fen said nothing. He was face down on the carpet, O.D.’d on hot chocolate and Chex Party Mix.

Kurt scooped him up, bamfed, tucked, and was back within five minutes. “Like a little wolf cub,” he said cheerfully, doing a neat little forward flip over the back of the couch to land easily between his fiancé and Bruce, draping his arms around each of their shoulders. He was wearing a holiday t-shirt Loki had made for him. It showed two deer playing chess at table in a forest clearing, each of the pieces shaped like woodland creature.

Clint had a good chuckle when he saw it. “Reindeer games!”

Jöri displayed his own shirt, where the reindeer played Monopoly.

Tony’s six deer had poker hands, stacks of wooden chips and shifty expressions.

They managed, somehow, to look exactly like the Avengers.


	3. Blame It On Bach, Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce helps Loki through difficulties, and also finds out why the god of mischief needed him to come to the penthouse (absent Steve's Christmas present isn't going to look after itself). And then... Bruce has a plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art Nouveau art, architecture and decorative arts were especially popular between 1890 and 1910. Its main inspirations were Celtic art and the curving lines of plants and flowers. Art Deco, which combines modernist style with craftsmanship and luxurious materials, began in France just before WWI and had its heyday in the 1920's, continuing in the more subdued form of Streamline Moderne through the 1930's.
> 
> The BBC comedy _Blackadder II_ (1986), set in the Elizabethan Era, actually does feature a similar line, though Blackadder speaks of "the ape-creatures of the Indus" rather than "Barbary Apes." Barbary Apes (more accurately called Barbary macaques) are a species of tailless monkeys found in Gibraltar, Morocco and Algeria.
> 
> The type of line dancing Bruce is thinking of involves people standing in lines and performing synchronized dance movements, often in a country-western dance bar or club.
> 
> Manhattan restaurant _Aquavit_ is real, though presumably they don't actually have a culinary student god of thunder doing prep in their kitchen.
> 
> The "Wyeth" referenced here is Andrew, rather than his father (N. C.) or son (Jaime).
> 
> Bruce and Loki are listening to the Christmas song " _O Holy Night_."
> 
> Zambonis are the large, heavy vehicles with rollers that are used to smooth the ice at ice rinks.
> 
>  _hubris_ =extreme pride, especially in one's self or one's abilities   
> In Greek tragedies that level of pride often offended the gods and brought about the hero's downfall.

* * *

Bruce tried hard to recall if he’d ever spent an extended time alone in a room with Loki. He honestly didn’t think he had. Ever. He probably would have remembered. Like root canals and the kind of bars where people line-danced, it had always been one of those situations he tried to avoid, especially since, up until the past week, the most positive thing he might have said about his relationship with his best friend’s husband was that the dude confused him. From there it all kind of went downhill.

Being freed from evil A.I. mind-control hadn't really done much to change that basic impression. Loki was just so… weird.

 _You’d think he was an alien or something_ , Bruce reminded himself.

He found himself glancing around the living room in an uncomfortable, shifty-eyed way, at a total loss as to how he could possibly sustain their conversation. If he even wanted to sustain the conversation, which was semi-debatable. Less than ten minutes had passed since his arrival, according to the newish old clock on the mantelpiece—analog, of course, since digital time-keeping devices offended Loki’s artistic sensibilities, and he refused to accept them except in scientific or medical situations where he could grudgingly admit precision might be necessary.

“The Barbary apes have mastered the learning of telling time by the clock!” Loki had exclaimed once, during a conversation on that particular subject.

“I'm pretty sure you swiped that line from Blackadder,” Bruce informed him.

“Hell, Loki probably taught that line to Blackadder,” Tony laughed, linking his fingers with his husband’s.

“The clock is Art Deco,” Loki informed them. “I enjoy things of the period very much.”

“If you think about it, babe, your armor’s a little Art Deco,” Tony said. “The basic lines? And the way the kind of weavy pieces over your chest come together at angles?”

“I had not thought so,” Loki answered, “But you are correct. How clever of you to notice, husband.”

“I’m a clever kind of guy,” Tony said, leaning over to kiss Loki’s ear.

“I also enjoy Art Nouveau,” Loki continued, “But the style is too feminine for Tony’s taste. He is not _ergi_ , as I am.”

“Wait. I thought _ergi_ meant ‘gay.’” Bruce said.

“One need not be gay, as you call it, to be _ergi_. To be _ergi_ is to see—to take in the information of the universe—ever with one eye feminine and one eye masculine. Tony is completely male, in your parlance bisexual, and sees the world with both eyes masculine. I am completely male…”

“But with a uterus,” Bruce put in.

“I have not a uterus,” Loki said, with some dignity. “I have a womb.”

“I've got it! Fwomb!” Tony said. “For 'false womb?'”

“Whatever we term it,” Loki said drily. “It remains that I am male, gay, and _ergi_ —I look out with the eye of a man, and with the eye of a woman.”

“And I’d have you no other way," Tony told him, kissing the side of his head this time. “But you’re still not gonna fill up the house with Art Nouveau shit.”

“I have given my word,” Loki replied. “Though call not things I enjoy ‘shit,’ if you please, _hjarta minn_.”

Loki had gone on, incomprehensibly, for a while about where he’d found the clock, how he’d restored it, etc., etc., etc., then asked Tony about something he’d been working on—the “Glamour Circuit” to change his suit’s appearance, and the conversation had moved off onto firmer (and more interesting, to Bruce's way of thinking, anyway) ground.

Bruce now found the subdued tick-tick-tick of the clock strangely mesmerizing, and the two of them had no Tony to pull them out of their conversational swamp.

Loki sipped his water. Bruce sipped his o.j. The silence became even more awkward, if such a thing was possible.

“Tony accompanied our younglings to the ice-skating rink of Mr. Rockefeller,” Loki finally said. “I have not even seen the Great Tree of Christmas or the golden man Thor tells me of, except on the television.”

Christ, he was like a big, skinny, kicked puppy and it made Bruce feel completely shitty. The Loki of his paranoid imagination spent his time hatching maniacal plans, not getting sad because the other kids got to go skating and he was stuck home alone all bored and sick.

“Did Thor go too?”

Loki nodded mournfully. “And Lady Jane, who is also with child, yet is radiant, of strong stomach, and not confined in any way.”

To distract him, Bruce gestured toward the snack plate. “What’s all this? It looks tasty.”

“They are cheeses of the Northlands, gifted to us by the owner of the fine Norse restaurant _Aquavit_ , where Thor performs his externship. Of this establishment we are excellent customers. Chef Emma Bengtsson has also been so kind as to send lovely things home to me, often new things which she tries for her menu. It has been a boon with Mrs. Ransome by her relations for the holiday.”

“I was wondering why I hadn’t seen her around,” Bruce said.

“Her daughter, who was great with child, has just given birth to a girl-baby upon Christmas Day. As a gift, I have painted a mural upon canvas, in the theme and dimensions of the child’s room, yet I know not if I ought to buy her something also. I know not the customs for many Midgardian occasions, Bruce. Not the least of which is the rules that govern the exchanging of gifts at Christmas.”

Bruce drank his juice, and didn’t say anything. He’d ordered Tony's husband a pretty nice Sumi-e set from Dick Blick Art Supply, figuring that even if Loki didn’t immediately take to Japanese inkpainting, he’d at least enjoy the attractive brocade box the set came in, the elegant porcelain waterwell and brush-rest, and the multiple other pieces.

It had been the first gift Loki opened. He come fully awake, examined each piece and exclaimed over it, and thanked Bruce kindly.

He hadn’t, not that it mattered, given Bruce anything in return. The other Avengers, yes, Bruce, no. Considering, really, the way he'd generally treated Loki the whole time he lived in the tower, he probably wouldn't have given himself anything either. A big lump of coal in his stocking, maybe.

Tony gave Bruce a state-of-the-art compact gas spectrometer with all the bells and whistles. And a Nerf gun.

In fact, they all got Nerf guns (for team-building, Tony said).

Tony played Santa, since it was his place, and also so he wouldn’t accidentally get handed stuff by mistake, which he still hated, for reasons unknown. This, of course, meant they had to open the toys first.

“For fucking off when we don’t want to work,” Clint put in gleefully. Luckily, the kids were already in bed at that point, as was Loki.

“What did you get your husband, Tony?” Pepper asked.

“Uh. Baby. Ungrateful bastard says it makes him sick.” Tony grinned, though his eyes still looked worried.

“Actually,” he went on, “You know that insane bookstore about three blocks over? The one with the creaky wood floors, that’s completely crammed with old books—like, twelve feet up to the ceiling? The guy who owns it is in his eighties, and lately it’s been closed as much as it’s been open.”

“Loki loves that place,” Kurt said. “In fact, it’s nearly his favorite shop in the entire city. Did Mr. Hemingway find you something special for _mein lieber Freund_ Loki?” Little Blue shook his head at their skeptical expressions. “No, it’s actually the owner's name. He’s the late Ernest’s distant cousin, I believe.”

“Ooh, no, my fuzzy German friend!” Tony exclaimed. “Better that that! After having it inspected for rodents, cockroaches and vampires, replacing the primordial bathroom and converting one of the storerooms to a lovely writing room for my honey, a transaction was made, and the lesser-known Mr. Hemingway is now enjoying a happy retirement, with a comfortable monthly income and a beach home in Key West, and Loki is the proud owner of a bookstore.”

“Owning a business counts as gainful employment outside the home,” Phil spoke up. “I know Loki had his worries about going back to the university right away. I suppose it’s easier, also, with his health situation..."

He clearly noticed, but appeared to ignore Tony's sardonic, raised-eyebrow, _Why, Phil, it's as if you care!_ look.

"Loki can bring in employees to take up the slack." The Director reached over to his side, clearly meaning to stroke the floppy-once-more ears of his enormous dog. "Tony, where's Anastasia?"

Clint snickered, "One guess, sugarbeet."

Phil gave a sigh of mock despair. "Even my own dog betrays me!"

General laughter followed. The Great Dane's adoration for Loki was well known. If allowed, she'd follow him everywhere with a look of besotted love in her big, brown eyes.

 _Maybe I should get a dog_ , Bruce thought, then remembered he couldn't even keep his houseplants alive.

“And you got me a goddamn giant plush rabbit, Stark? You truly suck beyond belief!” Pepper giggled. She was slightly tipsy and had a lapful of cuddly Natasha. “What did Loki get you?”

“Um…” Tony looked down into his own lap, where his fingers twisted together, the way Loki’s sometimes did. "I maybe can’t…”

“You should show,” Thor said, with his booming voice unusually gentle, “What lives deepest in your heart, my brother.”

With a shrug, Tony retreated to Loki’s music alcove, returning with an elegantly and simply-framed oil painting.

The work wasn’t quite the god’s usual style, there were elements of Rembrandt in the lighting, maybe Wyeth in the concrete details, various Italian Renaissance painters in the vivid jewel tones, creamy whites and velvety blacks.

Bruce had fulfilled several Humanities credits by taking Art History in college. Humanities in general, though he loved to read, weren’t so much his thing, but he’d found himself loving the paintings, thinking about them long after class was through.

He’d realized maybe the only beauties he’d known in his life were the things he’d glimpsed through a microscope, and made it a point, ever after, to really try to look at the greater world. Not just paintings, but nature, too, and people if they were beautiful—not just attractive, you could find that anywhere, but people the way Rembrandt painted them, wearing their souls like sunlight on their faces.

Loki’s painting looked like something that should hang in a museum and be worth several million. Probably someday it would be. For now, Tony’s hand hovered just over the surface while his face did something really complicated that the opposites of “happy” and “sad” didn’t begin to cover.

“My family,” Tony said, voice cracking. “I didn’t blow it, guys. I didn’t. I didn’t lose them.”

He got up fast, excusing himself. Bruce got up too, meaning to follow, to make sure his friend was okay, but Logan stopped him, one big hand closing on his arm.

“Good thought, Banner, but it’s not yer minute. Let the man go, he’s okay.”

A few minutes later, Tony texted:

 _party on dudes_  
_imma spend a little time w my baby_  
_c u in the am bb_

Bruce grinned. “He’s telling us to party on, so he _must_ be okay.”

Clint was still staring at the painting. “Okay, there’s Tony, like the king of his castle. There’s Loki, and I’m guessing the little glowworm in his lap is next year’s big arrival? I get the Terrible 3—look at Fen with his little wolf plushie—that’s cute—and Jöri with his dragon puppet. I’ll even hazard a guess that the nice-lookin’ older ladies are their moms, and the thirty-something in the purple shirt is Loki’s English kid. But what about the teenager? The salt-and-pepper-set twins? The little munchkin on Tony’s lap who looks just like him?”

Everyone looked pointedly at Kurt, who would know if anyone did.

“The oldest boy is Sleipnir, who still… lives… in Asgard,” the young German said. “The twins are Narfi and Vali, Loki’s first children. The toddler is Wilhelm, but it’s for Tony or Loki to tell you about him. The name of the painting is “ _Við Elskum og Við Minnumst_.”

“ _We Love and We Remember_ ,” Thor said softly, his eyes wet. He was staring at his mother’s warm, lovely, intelligent face.

Bruce figured if he had a picture of his mom, a real one, that truly captured her, he’d stare too, and feel sad, but at the same time, feel so, so, so much love for her, the only one he’d ever loved, who’d also loved him in return.

Leaning forward from the couch, Loki began to point out to Bruce the various cheeses, like a kind of dairy sommelier.

“This _Snøfrisk_ , in the small pots, is creamy and spreadable, the first pot being juniper berry, the second dill. I fear many Americans will not care for the _Pultost_ , since it is sour and flavored with seeds of caraway, which I dearly love, I confess. Tony does enjoy it, which gladdens me. The  _Nøkkelost_ , which I sadly cannot eat, for it is made of the milk of cows, is quite pleasant, Tony says, and flavored with cumin and cloves. You will almost undoubtedly hate the _Gjetost_ , as it is sweet, with a flavor almost of caramel, and very dense. In my strangeness, I like it best, though my husband calls it ‘Baby Poop Cheese,’ which does not aid my appetite in any way. These savory biscuits are of whole wheat, and of rye. I like the rye above all, though Tony cares not for them…”

“I…” Loki slid down on his pillows suddenly. “Bruce, I… Your pardon, if you will,” he said, a little breathlessly.

Bruce felt suddenly like shit, because here Loki had put on his little cavalcade of Scandinavian cheeses, trying to be a good host, but now he looked suddenly increasingly sweaty, shaky and even paler than usual. It didn’t take all the medical knowledge in the world to guess that Loki was most likely both way out of bounds for his non-bedrest time and had blood sugar levels in the sub-sub-basement.

“Hey. Hey, Loki.” Bruce steadied the god’s head between his hands. He was barely even focusing. “C’mon, Loki, stay with me.” He levered him to lie nearly flat down, firmly on his left side, the better for his blood to circulate, then quickly twisted the cap off the apple juice, popping in the straw. “C’mon, honey, drink this, okay?”

 _Crap, I just called Loki “honey”_ —Bruce couldn’t help laughing at himself.

He moved to sit on the coffee table, the better to hold the juice steady.

“Sit not in the cheese plate, please?” Loki requested faintly.

“Noted.” Bruce scooted it out of the way.

After a bit, Loki started looking marginally better, even managing to hold the juice on his own.

Bruce pulled the afghan from the back of the couch to spread over him.

Loki snuggled into its fancily-knitted—or crocheted, Bruce could never tell the difference—folds, still clutching his apple-shaped bottle in one hand.

“I thank you, Bruce,” he said in the same faint voice. “I felt very cold, and this blanket, knitted for me by the skillful hands of the mother of Pepper Potts, is delightfully warm. It is also of my color, which I greatly enjoy.”

The afghan was indeed in his color, Bruce realized, the shade everyone--not just Tony--had started referring to as “Loki Green.”

“Better now?” Bruce rubbed the god’s shoulder, partly to be comforting, but mostly to keep Loki awake, because his eyes had gone from wide and frightened to heavy-lidded.

“Very well,” Loki answered sleepily.

“Nope. Uh-uh, my friend. You may be on bed rest, but you don’t get to sleep yet. This is the part where you get to stay awake and actually eat. Let’s sit here, maybe watch something, and have our little Taste of Scandinavia party. Does that sound okay? I’m going to start with a nice slice of Baby Poop Cheese, because it looks so delicious.” Bruce ostentatiously bit off a large corner.

His tongue instantly recoiled. “My god, Loki, that’s foul! It's like someone took the worst qualities of Skippy Peanut Butter and goat cheese, blended them together, and petrified them into a rock-hard brown substance."

Loki took the slice from him and happily consumed it. “It is very nutritious and gives good energy. Many of the Northmen take it with them when they ski, as a snack.”

Personally, Bruce thought many of the Northmen were insane, but he tried the one with cumin and clove, and found it actually very tasty. He liked the soft cheese with dill, too.

After a while, Loki slid up a little on the couch, using an app on his phone to switch on a mostly-instrumental album of Christmas music. They continued to munch in almost-companionable silence, listening, not talking, until one of the rare vocal tracks, two children singing in harmony, their high, sweet voices contrasted by the soft deep notes of a cello, from the quiet beginning to the high, high notes at the song’s climax. “O night… divine!” the two young voices swirled together in absolute joy, then dropped into the gentle wonder of, “O night… when Christ was born…” and the cello brought it all to a conclusion of utter peace.

Bruce sat in stunned silence. He wasn’t religious (the opposite, really), he’d heard that song approximately nine million times, but he’d never heard _that_.

That was…

A two second silence followed, then the cheerful voices of Jöri and Hela called out “Merry Christmas, Dad! We love you!” Fen's voice yelled, “Daddy!” and Loki chimed in, “Happy Christmas, Tony, _hjarta hjarta minn_.”

Bruce reached for the plate and found it basically empty. He felt as if he’d been run over. By a Zamboni, maybe, or one of those heavy roller-things used to smooth fresh asphalt.

“Huh,” he said.

“We were hungry, it seems,” Loki said, glancing at the grape stems and random cracker crumbs that were all that remained. “Bruce, I am sorry… I should not…”

“Why?” Bruce asked.

“Beg pardon?” Loki’s eyes were wide with apprehension. He looked like a dog expecting to get hit. Bruce knew that look—it was one of his, too.

“What are you saying ‘sorry’ for? Why are you apologizing? Why can you hear every single random thought that pops into my head, but you can’t tell what I’m feeling?”

“Oh.” Loki’s legs pulled up against his chest.

Make yourself small. Protect your soft belly.

Also very familiar.

“Because…” Loki began. He squirmed, clearly uncomfortable. “Because the music brought you no pleasure, and perhaps you believe now I played it for you as a form of braggery, though I truly did not. I played it because it is Boxing Day, and thus still Christmas, and I thought, as Tony did, you might hear loveliness in it, and find it relaxing, though you did not. And lastly because I wished to share my family with you, as even Jennifer, your most-charming cousin, is out of town. I hear your thoughts because I am highly attuned to words, and the sort of thoughts you reference are merely words formed in the foregrounds of your mind. Often here, as well…” Loki’s chilly fingers brushed Bruce’s throat. “It is called ‘subvocalization,’ minute changes in the tissues of the throat, when words are thought. I read such things easily. Perhaps, to aid you in avoiding me, I ought to have given you a wooly scarf, to replace the gift you will not deign to open.”

“Loki, you didn’t give me anything.”

“Kurt delivered it to your flat, as I thought you might like not to see it first in the company of others, and he left it by the large though sadly shrivelled jade plant in the corner, upon which you had hung a single red bauble.” Loki’s hands had started shaking again. He lowered his legs and slid back down on his pillows, turning his face into the top one.

“Loki, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

One of Loki’s shaky hands waved vaguely into the air.

“No, don’t just wave me off. The thing is, I really loved the music. I did. It just bowled me over when I found out it was you guys.”

Loki waved again, but this time his hand closed on Bruce’s wrist, gripping brutally tight.

It was all Bruce could do to tear himself away. And then he staggered back as the words crashed and tore into his brain, HELP ME… HELP ME… WE MUST… WE MUST…

Bruce staggered again, and then it hit him.

He ran for the kitchen at the same time he speed-dialed Natasha, who he knew was at home, binge-watching Hallmark Christmas movies with Pepper.

“’Tash, no questions. Go to Central and get the food. All the food.”

“Wha…?” It was the least-alert he’d ever heard her.

Bruce ripped open both the fridge and freezer at the same time. For Christmas, it was looking a little sad, probably a combination of no J.A.R.V.I.S., no Mrs. Ransome, and a lot of dining out and taking in.

He grabbed a couple more juices, the rest of the cheese and grapes, a package of lox, a couple familiar-looking boxes from the freezer, the remains of the orange juice, and a knife.

“All the food?” Natasha asked muzzily.

“We have an alien physiological crisis in the penthouse. I don’t know what he can eat. Just grab it all.”

He heard Pepper’s voice ask something in the background.

“Soonest is better,” Bruce said. “I’ll reimburse you in fudge.”

He hung up, dropped everything on the coffee table, and knelt by the couch, starting to twist the lid off one of the juices.

“NO!” Loki rose out of the cushions like something from a Japanese horror film, all crazy black hair, wild dark eyes and white, white skin. He grabbed the orange juice pitcher, tilted it over his face and basically just poured the whole thing down, his throat working in huge convulsions. The lox went next, followed by the cheeses, one by one, Loki scraping the soft ones out of their pots with desperate, trembling fingers.

 _The Monster That Ate Manhattan_ or _The Beast That Ate Manhattan_? Bruce thought.

Loki’s food rampage was not made more attractive by the fact that his eyes were streaming tears and his nose dripping blood.

When Natasha arrived, with Pepper in tow and both their arms laden, Loki was polishing off the last of the grapes. He still shook in giant tremors, and his tummy, beneath the clinging sweater, remained hollow as the mouth of a cave.

“Oh, sweetie!” Pepper said, dropped her arm-load onto the kitchen island, and disappeared into Hela’s bathroom, returning with several damp, black washcloths.

Natasha sorted a large casserole out from the rest, scooped a giant mound of white glop into a cereal bowl, and poured what appeared to be blood over the top.

“Not going to ask,” Bruce said.

“Norwegian rice pudding with lingonberry sauce, Loki's favorite dessert.” Pepper shook her head at him. “Honestly, Bruce.”

She handed Loki one of her washcloth supply, allowing him to clean himself up before Natasha handed him the pudding.

He tucked into it steadily, but at least not with quite the same desperation. Natasha sat beside him, rubbing Loki’s knee tenderly through the green afghan.

So much for "every woman but Natasha."

“Should we try to contact Tony?” Pepper asked, worriedly.

“Please, do ruin not his holiday,” Loki stopped eating long enough to beg. “Neither his, nor the children’s, nor my brother’s nor Jane’s. They ought not to suffer from my foolishness. I am well now.” He accepted a second bowl of rice pudding from Natasha. “Very well, now that I’ve eaten.”

“That was an epic blood sugar crash, if I’ve ever seen one. See now why Hank’s being cranky with you about eating? He means it, you need the nutrition, and so does Tony, Jr., there, or he’s not going to grow up big and strong.”

“Edwin,” Loki said softly. “His name is Edwin, and I would not harm him for my life. Bruce, that was truly only my blood’s sugar? I have been run through with a cold steel and felt better after. On multitudinous occasions.”

“Blood sugar,” Bruce corrected. “It’s definitely a thing, when you’re pregnant. That’s the reason for Hank’s orders. If you eat every two hours, like he said, things will be fine. What did you eat this morning before I arrived?”

“I was quite tired, and slow to arise.”

“I guess Christmas was kind of horrible for you.”

“Dreadful. The second now of which I have virtually no memory.” He started tracing the pattern of the afghan with his fingertip. Everything about his posture screamed, “Guilty little kid with a giant secret.”

“Sweetie…?” a slightly mom-ish tone had come into Pepper's voice.

“When he is in the city, Kurt attends the Church of St. Bernadette Soubirous on the Lower East Side,” Loki told them, “Quite close to my Club of Boys and Girls. Not very long past I repaired their organ, and while there, in the small, secret spaces behind the instrument I became aware of a presence. Though I sensed a great cloud of violence round him, nothing told me that, in this place, he would cause the least bit of harm. I left him alone, locked in a silence he could not understand, for the greatest truths of his life were shut fast within his mind. I sorrowed for this man, but must admit I gave to him only small thought after, until I came once more unto this church upon the Eve of Christmas. I have been studying somewhat the music of churches, and also had never attended a Mass of Midnight in the past. Tony may have mentioned that I am often filled with curiosity regarding various and divers things.

“It was when I played upon the organ, as requested by Father Jerome, priest of that parish, and the music surged to its highest peak of passion that I felt the man again. He came clear to me as a figure silhouetted against a strike of lightning, and I knew, in that instant, whose tormented small mind it was enclosed within that lost and troubled outer consciousness.

“My performance being concluded, I informed dear Kurt that I must absent myself, that he ought to enjoy the continuation of his service to his god, and I would see him on the morrow. I removed myself to the small, secret space, bespelled the soldier in his lair, and as I knew no other solution to my difficulty, teleported him here.”

Natasha said a word in Russian whose English translation could not possibly been spelled by more or less than four letters.

Loki had started gathering up fistfuls of the afghan now, and shaking again, though Bruce doubted that had anything to do with blood sugar, not this time. “By the _Nornir_ , my companions, why should it be my fate that all that should be gold in my hands turns to dross instead? He was meant for Steven, for his brother and Shield-Brother, as a gift at the time of Christmas.”

Loki removed the bowl from his lap to set it sharply on the table. “Because Steven was once also my friend and Shield-Brother, whom I love still, even knowing that now, although he is kind, our Captain loves me not, and never shall again.“

Loki was panting now, to go with his shaking. “I believed it would not be so very wrong, to restore him to his brother, lost and sad inside. as he felt. The shell, though--the construct--is furiouas with me indeed, and you must not allow the Other Guy to emerge soon, Bruce, for I could think of no other place that was safe to keep him except for the Hulk Tank, where I was also once kept, before being chained and muzzled, with only the prospect of my once-father's spite and Asgard's dungeon's before me.”

After all that, Loki could hardly catch his breath. He shook so hard his teeth rattled, and he had gone a shade of white paler than anything even Crayola could have conceived.

“Okay, first things first, Loki,” Bruce said, once he’d managed to catch his own breath, and stop his head from exploding. He was pretty damn proud of his own calm, not a trace of the Other Guy in sight. “Let’s get you lying down again, before you pass out on us.”

He lowered the god’s head onto his pillow, while Natasha smoothed down his legs and Pepper spread the afghan out over him.

Loki huddled into a small-as-he-could-get ball beneath its green folds.

“I have given him warmth, fresh clothes and ample to eat,” he said between the chatterings of his teeth. “And yet now, by your reactions I see I truly have done great harm. Is it not Christmas upon which one obtains gifts of excellent worth for one’s friends? And I had already gifted Steven, upon the anniversary of his birth-day, with a very fine fountain pen, upon receiving which he thankfully ceased calling me Laufeyson.”

 _God_ , Bruce thought, gazing down on the shivering lump of Loki under the blanket.

Like one of Thor’s thunderbolts, it suddenly hit him—that yes indeed, the god of mischief really fucking was every bit as young, sweet-hearted and monumentally screwed up as Tony said.

He drifted to the kitchen, pulled out another bottle of apple juice, popped a fresh straw in it and brought it to Loki, once more holding the glass apple so Loki could drink. Loki pushed it away after a few good pulls on the straw.

“That was very tasty, Bruce,” he said listlessly “I was unaccountably thirsty.”

“Okay,” Bruce told him, “I have to go away for a minute, but I’ll be right back. Are you warm enough? Can I get you anything else?”

Loki shook his head under the blanket, but the gesture reeked of self-punishment.

Pepper, with an efficient air, fetched Hela’s elegant black duvet from her room, spreading it over the shivering god. “Loki, why don’t I stay with you for a while, and we’ll try to get ourselves all calmed down. I’d love to hear Tony’s Christmas album again, would that be okay?”

“Hang tight,” Bruce said. "No getting up except for the bathroom. Try to catch a nap.”

No answer from Loki, who was now sobbing under his duvet in quiet misery, while Pepper sat on the end of the couch and rubbed his feet.

Bruce and Natasha left the penthouse in silence, Nat pulling her fiery hair back into a ponytail as she went.

On the elevator, she asked, “Mind if we stop off at my floor so I’m not forced to confront Hydra’s number one assassin in my hearts-and-flowers p.j.’s?”

“They’re pretty cute though,” Bruce said.

“Shut up, Banner,” Natasha told him.

While he waited for her to change, Bruce texted Clint:

_meet @ ht plz?_

_u hulking?_ Clint texted back.

_xmas gift 2 cap frm loki=uhoh_

To no one’s surprise, Clint beat them there.

After three seconds of staring, Natasha, now in her Black Widow getup of black leather, or spandex, or whatever the hell it was, looked as close to shocked as Bruce had ever seen her.

“Yes, it’s him all right,” she said finally. “It’s Barnes.”

Inside the Hulk Tank were two fluffy pillows in navy blue cases, a red, white and blue duvet, a small selection of paperbacks, a picnic basket and a furious Winter Soldier in heavy smeared eyeliner, glaring at them like evil incarnate through the unbreakable glass.

“Loki already bought Steve a nice fountain pen for his birthday,” Bruce said, “So for Christmas he thought he’d get him a Hydra-brainwashed assassin instead.”

“If Steve actually has shit to lose,” Clint said, “I believe it will be lost. I’m still trying to work out how to tell Phil as Phil-my-darling-boyfriend instead of Phil-the-director-of-S.H.I.E.L.D. I didn’t love the precedent they set with Loki.” He spread one hand out on the glass, while the mortal form of James Buchanan Barnes glared back at him as if he could send eye-beams through and toast Clint like a marshmallow.

It was then Bruce noticed that the can’t-see-it-barely-know-it’s-there hearing aid wasn’t in Clint’s ear and knew, then, that Clint had previously received one Christmas present from Loki, and it wasn’t the handcrafted and inlaid English longbow he’d opened from under the tree.

And then the thought hit him, and Bruce nearly staggered with the weight of it, even as the level-headed scientist within him recoiled.

Loki’s magic, so far as Bruce could tell, manipulated various and sundry forms of energy—matter, light, sound, and whatever it was that powered his inexplicable feats.

And what were gamma rays?

That’s right, go to the head of the class, girls and boys!

Tony’s theory had always been that they hadn’t been able to duplicate the original experiments or modify their results because they hadn’t been able calibrate their equipment closely enough to pinpoint exactly what they wanted their results to be.

Loki did that stuff instinctively.

Often by snapping his fingers.

Or by frowning a little at the thing he wanted to affect.

Or, sometimes, by brushing it lightly with a fingertip.

Loki could do it. He could make the Other Guy…

He could…

 _Abracadabra_ , Other Guy! Be gone for good!

And Bruce could have everything he ever wanted.

Every single damn thing. Normal home. Normal job. Normal friends. Spouse. Family. Hobbies. He could play goddamn touch football without worrying about turning into a green rage behemoth.

Furthermore, Loki not only could do it, he _would_.

He’d do it even though it killed him. There wasn't even any question.

Because Bruce had guessed his weakness, his true Achilles heel, and it wasn’t _hubris_ , princely pride, or arrogance. It wasn’t choosing inferior allies, or having poor planning skills.

It wasn’t even the secret location of his cold, hard sorcerer’s heart, thought to be kept safe outside his body, like in the fairy tales.

No, it was his sad, young, broken sorcerer’s heart, thumping away as best it could inside his chest, hoping so desperately to be loved.


	4. Shutting the Barn Door

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Thor is a wonderful brother, Tony is content with his lot in life, Pepper _will_ discuss things, the boys are confused by homonyms and Steve isn't getting a horse for Christmas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The ice skating rink at Rockefeller Center was opened to the public in 1936. 150 people at a time can skate beneath the iconic Christmas tree and the golden statue of Prometheus.
> 
> Dubuque, Iowa is a city on the Mississippi River. It occupies about 33 square niles and has a population of around 58,000 people. Through no fault of its own, the city's name sometimes used to denote a place not exactly on the cutting edge of urban life. 
> 
> schmuck=a foolish, obnoxious, or detestable person The term, a variation on the Yiddish word " _schmok_ " (meaning penis) came into use in the late19th century, and into widespread popular use during the last quarter of the 20th century.
> 
> _Our Mutual Friend_ (1865) was the last novel completed by Charles Dickens.
> 
> Thor isn't wrong in his assessment of _Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer_ , the stop motion animated Christmas special produced by Videocraft International, Ltd., which later became Rankin/Bass Productions. It first brought its message of societally-approved bullying, stereotypical gender-roles and forced conformity to the viewing public on Dec. 6, 1964.

* * *

Down the block, a cab was letting Cap out near the front entrance, Steve unfolding himself from the rear seat and bending back inside for a minute, probably to pay the driver (in cash, of course) and say something anachronistically polite.

Steve clearly didn't notice Tony, the boys, Thor and Jane crossing from the opposite corner, even though Tony lifted a hand in greeting. With his cap pulled low, the collar of his jacket turned up, and his old man brown-leather suitcase clutched in one hand, Steve-o looked preoccupied, a million miles--and probably about seventy years--away, and somewhat less than brimming with Christmas cheer.

Cap was supposed to be in D.C. for the holidays, celebrating with the Wilsons until after the New Year, so Tony couldn't help but wonder what gave. Trouble brewing in the Big Apple? Steve missing his spangle suit? Sam and family annoyed beyond endurance by the huge stick permanently implanted far up Steve's ass?

Tony thought of calling out to his teammate, in either a friendly or a mocking way, but didn't. For one thing, this wasn't Dubuque. He had his New York City cool to consider. For another...

Well, Steve didn’t really look like he’d welcome the interruption. It hit Tony that maybe this season wasn't the easiest for ol' Cap. Maybe he even had fond memories of times never to return again, and during the holidays those memories became a bit much for even Steven Rogers to deal with.

Watch it Stark, Tony warned himself, _People will think you're getting all soft and squishy in your elder years._

“Huh, Cap got back early,” was all he commented to his companions. “Guess D.C. wasn’t so full of the old Xmas spirit. Teach him to ditch his team for a so-called better deal.”

He grinned to show the others he didn’t mean anything by the snark. Which he didn’t. Much. He actually did feel sorry for Cap. A little bit. Maybe.

“I sense perplexity in our Captain's manner,” Thor answered, looking slightly perplexed himself. He had Fen, who still needed naps now and then, sacked out dead-to-the-world across one mighty shoulder. Thor rubbed his back gently and comfortingly as he strode along, occasionally incorporating a soothing little sway into his walk.

They looked pretty damn adorable together, the giant man and the small, stocky boy, and Tony, with a (for him) unusually strong sense of Christmas cheer and family feeling, hoped Jane took notice, that the sight filled her with a sense of happiness and security, knowing her partner wasn't just some random god of thunder, he'd make a hell of a good daddy for their future kids, too.

Tony's previous associations with the word "uncle" involved guys who showed up at random holidays, ate and drank too much, mocked a child about things that already made him self-conscious, and talked non-stop about boring shit. Thor wasn't any of those things. He'd been a great uncle, loving, involved and patient, the kind of uncle who played, who cooked breakfasts, who was _there_ for his niece and nephews.

All that made Tony feel more than just a little ashamed. He’d once dismissed Thor as a giant idiot with biceps instead of brains, but some time past had seriously needed to revise his opinions. Beneath the bulky muscles, his enormous size in general, and his almost ridiculous good looks, lurked a lot of heart. Freedom from his dad’s insane, non-stop mind-games had allowed a really decent guy to emerge, a man who never failed to be loyal to and fiercely protective of those he loved.

So, okay, maybe that protectiveness got a little bit on Loki’s nerves from time to time, but every big brother’s protectiveness got on the nerves of every younger brother who ever lived, now and then. The two of them had thrown off decades of envy and suspicion, centuries of competition that never needed to have been, and Loki, Tony knew, cared for his brother deeply.

More than that, Tony suspected his husband _needed_ Thor, probably just as much as he needed Tony himself. Loki had things--huge things--to work through, and Thor made a substantial anchor for him as he navigated those treacherous seas. Having come again to a place of trust, Loki once more believed in his brother unshakably, with an almost childlike belief. He could accept help from Thor that he couldn't bring himself to take from anyone else.

“Really?" Tony squinted into the distance. "Must be nice to possess that godlike vision. Your brother keeps telling me I need glasses, and maybe he's right, because I can just about make out that Steve has a face. Blurry pink thing, right?”

Jöri giggled. Thor gave Tony a look, deadpan, one godly eyebrow cocked.

“I saw _that_ clearly enough,” Tony responded, and laughed. “I wonder what’s put a bee in Steve-o’s bonnet.”

Jane, who’d been chattering most of the way home about the lights, the skating and the city’s whole holiday ambiance (nearly as excited as the kids had been, before they ran out of steam), wrapped her tiny hands as best she could around her fiancé’s massive arm.

“Just an expression, sweetie,” she told Thor, “Not a real bee.”

For a second, she and Tony exchanged looks that clearly said, _You too?_

Jöri, typically polite, interrupted with a gentle tug to Tony’s gloved hand. “That was a good day, huh, Daddy? Will _Pabbi_ come next year too? And Hela? Please?”

They didn’t express it often, complain, or make a fuss, but both boys missed their sister terribly, Tony knew that. He also knew he himself missed his Childlike Empress like whoa.

As for Loki… what Loki felt was probably too big, and too dark, ever to put into words.

“Next year, it’s the whole crew, come hell or high water,” Tony answered, “Your _Pabbi_ and I wouldn’t have it any other way, my honeys. Believe me, it’s gonna happen.”

If Tony had anything to say about the situation, he would make it happen, for his family, for all of them. They'd be together, and everything would be just the way it should be again.

Tony realized, suddenly and unexpectedly (Steve and his bonnet-bees aside), that he actually felt confident. That things would work out. That, in this moment he felt almost perfectly balanced in his world.

"Balanced?" Jöri asked with just a hint of skepticism in his tone, and Tony had to laugh again. Clearly that particular word couldn't be applied to his skating. Or Jane's for that matter, because both of them skated like the bastard offspring of zombies and Frankenstein’s monster. Thor and the two boys had glided and zipped around them on the ice like dragonflies, damn their superior _Ӕsir_ genes.

"Emotional balance, buddy," Tony told his son, "Not my sad lack of athletic grace."

Jöri nodded sagely. "Indeed," he answered, a whole world of Loki-esque "because I love you, I will humor your delusions" in his tone. As Tony'd once told Hela, certain apples didn't fall very far from the tree.

Tony, though, didn't think he'd exaggerated. In his emotions, in his sense of himself and his place in the world, he felt remarkably content, and that was quite the rush, stronger than any of the temporary highs he'd gained from the many, many illicit substances he'd tried in his life.

Family no longer meant emotionally distant parents, or dead parents, no longer referred to an aunt or two, or a smattering of cousins, he didn’t really know. Family meant his beautiful, brave, brilliant, impossible husband, his fantastic kids, his brother-in-law and almost-sister-in-law, dear friends like Bruce and Pepper, Logan and Kurt (and maybe Rhodey too, soon, since Tony had nearly decided to forgive him, in the spirit of the season) and, yes, not to be soppy, even his team.

If Loki had just felt better,and Hela was at home, he would have had a Christmas that was everything he’d ever wanted, and even as things were, snuggling a sleepy, silly Loki in the middle of a group of people who really, actually cared about him, while everyone talked and opened gifts and laughed together, totally did not suck.

Best of all, maybe, he hadn’t even thought about drinking. Not once. He'd just kind of forgotten. Marvel at that boys and girls!

Also, throughout today’s outing, nobody had called about Loki, and Loki hadn’t called. That had to be good news, right?

Hopefully his sometimes-wayward husband had curled up on the couch all day just like he was supposed to, falling asleep repeatedly to the Dickens novel he was reading ( _Our Mutual Friend,_ this time--Loki did love his Dickens, his word-porn, falling into those long, elegant, convoluted sentences), or to the stack of Christmas movies in the queue, and nibbling on grapes and crackers and Scandinavian cheeses.

Damn, he hadn’t thought, but there was a ton of food in the Avengers fridge, too. He should have gotten Thor to make up some snack-packs or sandwiches or something for his brother, stuff Loki could grab and then go curl up again, no thought required.

Maybe, despite Loki’s objections (“I require not a lady’s maid,” his husband had responded with scorn, when Tony broached the idea), he actually _should_ get someone in, some kind of home healthcare person-slash-personal assistant, to look after Loki, at least until Mrs. Ransome returned. Mrs. R had readily agreed to increase her hours when Tony asked, despite her recent elevation to the state of grandmotherhood. But then, crazy as she seemed to be about her daughter and new grandbaby, she didn’t seem anxious to spend that much time around her daughter’s schmuck of a boyfriend. Add to that, Loki appeared well on his way to taking a place in her heart as the son she’d never had.

Loki often had that effect on people, Tony noticed. He just had to look at them with those big green (currently purple) eyes of his, and they wanted to take him home and feed him cookies.

Damn, he really should have called Loki himself, at some time during the festivities, just to say ‘I love you’ and check in.

Loki knew him though, knew Tony got caught up in stuff, and forget sometimes, and it never seemed to bother him. Maybe that was an Asgardian thing. Nobody, after all, was going to stop the war and phone home from the battlefield.

Mellow as Tony currently felt, he wondered if a time would ever come when he didn’t worry about Loki. Headstrong, heroic and reckless were not always the world’s best combination. Not to forget fragile. So fragile. Which was the one Loki himself constantly tended to forget. Every time he got hurt he always looked like he was counting to five, waiting to be fine again, then getting shocked when the rapid healing didn’t happen.

“How’s your _Pabbi_ doing?” Tony asked Jöri, casually. Next to Hela, his snow-haired son had the best Lokidar in the family. He'd know if anything came up.

“He’s very sleepy.” A smile flitted across Jör’s face as his mind touched his _Pabbi’s_. “Auntie Pepper’s with him.”

Well, that was decent of Pep—though he thought he'd heard about plans for day-after-Christmas retail madness with Natasha, the word "shoes" having been mentioned more than once. Maybe they'd taken a look in their shared closet (which could have comfortably housed a family of four) and decided they could afford to skip the shopping, just this once, and cocoon at home instead.

Tony was still pondering this question--why Loki and Pep were hanging together--when they ran into Steve again in the lobby.

Grandpa had parked himself in front of the Avengers-dedicated elevator with his old man bag hugged to his chest and a grim expression on his face, looking both lost and as if he wasn't quite sure what to do next.

“Works better with buttons, Steve,” Tony said mildly, reaching past his teammate to key in his own entry code.

Steve startled violently, like he'd been sleepwalking but woke up suddenly. “Oh. Yes. What?”

“Late night, Cap?”

Steve rubbed his eyes. Uh… yes… Mmn… Sorry. Yes. I had really, really strange dreams.”

“My most-loved brother obtained for you a gift,” Thor informed Cap conversationally. “I know not what it might be, but he seemed greatly concerned that you were not at home by yester eve. Though he felt most of the day quite unwell, he asked after you repeatedly.”

"Understatement of the year, Steve," Tony added.

“I’m sorry,” Steve answered in the same absent tone. “I hope he’s feeling better today.”

“He yet slept when we departed,” Thor answered, “For I saw upon him numerous signs that he slumbered not well through the night.”

“He heard Santa on Christmas Eve, and tripped on Daddy’s coat and got hurt,” Jöri said helpfully. “Which is why we always put things away where they belong, not leave them on the floor.” His son gave Tony a significant look.

“Thanks for the reminder, son,” Tony said drily.

Fen raised his sleepy head suddenly off his uncle’s shoulder.

“Barn,” he said distinctly. “Barns?”

A big grin split Jöri’s face. “If _Pabbi_ got you a horse, Uncle Steve, may I ride it sometimes?”

Tony laughed. “Honey, why would your _Pabbi_ get Uncle Steve a horse? That would be a pretty random gift for someone who wasn’t expecting one. Where would he keep a horse anyway?”

God, Jöri looked just like his _Pabbi_ when he got all big-eyed and upset.

“In... In the Hulk Tank, Daddy! I’m sorry to spoil the secret, but it’s important, and it’s all Fen and I can get. ‘Hulk Tank’ and ‘barns.’ And the only barn creature we thought of that might need the Hulk Tank was a horse, in case it got scared and kicked. And a horse would also be a lovely present because horses are lovely.”

“Barnes,” Steve repeated. He’d gone whiter than Loki. “Oh, Hell’s bells.”

“Hey, I’ve got an idea,” Tony said to the boys. He knew about barns--or, rather, one Barnes: James Buchanan Barnes, AKA The Winter Soldier.

“This elevator’s so slow. Why don’t you go up in the family elevator with Auntie Jane and get started on that octopus puzzle Santa brought you? If your silly _Pabbi_ left a horse in the Hulk Tank, it’s probably pooped all over the place and Uncle Steve’s gonna needed some help cleaning up. I don’t think Uncle Bruce wants to find his tank all full of horse ploppy next time he needs it, do you?”

Fen, awake now and on his feet, giggled as Jane steered him away, but Jöri threw Tony a last searching look.

“I sense a hubbub,” Thor said, as the elevator finally arrived, and the doors opened.

Tony kind of wanted that one on a t-shirt.

Thor, as they entered, also somehow suddenly had Mjolnir in his fist.

“Loki made me a pocket universe, to accompany me where I might go,” his brother-in-law said cheerfully. “It is most convenient, for the keeping of my things, when I would not have them occupy my hands, or be shown to the general populace.”

“Is there actually any part of ‘don’t use magic’ that your brother comprehends?” Tony asked rhetorically.

“But, Tony, dearest-brother-by-law, do you not yet comprehend?” Thor asked gently. “It is not, for my brother, as if I said unto you, ‘Anthony, put down your sword and take it not up again,’ it is as though I commanded, ‘Anthony, breathe not, and let your heart not beat, until I give you leave.’ Loki is not a creature who _uses_ magic, as one might use that sword, as a weapon or tool. Loki _is_ magic, in essence and nature, though he struggles mightily, for your sake, to curtail himself. Be not angry with my brother, Tony, for what he does, he does, ever, from greatest love.”

* * *

“My sweetlings!” Loki struggled out of sleep at the impact of a warm soft body across his chest. “You are returned! Tell me of the skating of Mr. Rockefeller!”

He had expected to feel joy and delight from his sons, but instead detected no small amount of worry and consternation. Instantly, the last of the drowsiness left him.

“What is amiss? Jöri, what has befallen?” Loki gathered the two boys close, performing a quick scan of their bodies. They were well, whole of limb. Tony, Thor and Jane had also returned, and like the younglings, their forms held the flush of health and recent exercise. Then why…?

Oh. Yes. So it was.

For a moment Loki could not breathe. Pepper’s hand alighted on his shoulder and concern filled her face. Loki patted the comforting hand absently.

“Dearest Lady Pepper, I must seek out my husband and speak with him. Would you be so kind as to entertain my children until my return? I promise I shall not be long.”

“Jane’s here too,” Pepper told him gently. “But I have a better idea, sweetie. Why don’t you stay where you are, and we’ll have Tony march himself right on up here to you?”

She turned to the boys. “Where’d your dad get off to, anyway?”

Loki knew very well where his husband had gone to, and that, wherever Pepper was involved, much discussion would ensue. Also, in such discussions, Pepper could indeed be very hard to best.

To save Pepper, and himself, the trouble, to avoid all that to-do, he side-stepped neatly through the fabric of the air itself, and so into the Hulk Tank antechamber.

And woke up sometime later on his back on the floor, dreadfully dizzy and confused, with a thumping headache and Bruce by his side, attempting to force him to drink juice again.

Loki thought of refusing, then decided he had best not, lest he seem uncooperative, or ungrateful for the attention. Besides which, he felt surpassingly thirsty.

With the juice inside him, Loki felt immediately improved, quite well enough to sit up, with Tony’s support, though he floated in an almost blissful weariness. Eyes shut, he rested against his husband’s chest, collecting his thoughts, sorting through the complex storms of emotional weather swirling through the chamber.

“Someone,” Tony said, “Is in so much trouble.”

A touch of his mind, though, said he wasn’t really angry, he’d only been first startled, then badly frightened by Loki’s collapse, for which Loki felt great remorse.

He touched his husband lovingly and soothingly in return, and felt Tony's mind settle.

“Hey, Clint, you should make that sound again so Loki can hear,” Natasha said (within, she felt disturbed and not disturbed all at once, her mind weaving patterns of emotion Loki found deeply confusing). “’Cause that was really special. What was it? Something like, ‘Wheeeyaaaah! Foooock!”

The archer began to laugh heartily at his partner’s high-pitched imitation, and harder still as Tony and Bruce each gave his own version. Only Thor, standing slightly apart from the others, with his powerful arms crossed over his chest, remained somber, while Steven seemed troubled and downcast.

“That’s me,” Clint said, laughing with the rest, “International man of stealth, mystery and intrigue.”

“And toddler screams,” Tony put in.

“And toddler screams,” Clint agreed.

Thor commenced pacing with great determination. Mjolnir, still hanging from her tether about his wrist, swung furiously with the force of his motion. Loki wondered, indeed, if thunder would shortly follow, and what its effect would be within that contained space.

“Something you want to share, big guy?” Tony asked mildly.

Thor paced several moments more, before turning with a face truly full of thunder, pointing at Loki’s husband angrily.

“You!” he rumbled. “How do you allow it, husband of my brother, beneath your very roof? Does he mean nothing to you? I had excused you, for a time, knowing the baleful influences of the drink, and of your wicked Ghost-in-the-Wall. But now that you partake not of the drink, and the Ghost is no more, what am I to believe? Who shall care for my Loki if I do not, as has always been the way?”

“Thor,” Loki said softly, grateful, yet sad that Thor felt this burden.

Tears stood in his brother’s bright eyes—tears for him—and Loki's heart came closed to breaking.

“Thor, dearest brother, all is well, no harm has been done. I departed the penthouse and arrived as I did only to swiftly escape the many well-reasoned discussions of dearest Lady Pepper, against which I have few defenses.”

Thor came to crouch in front of him, touching Loki’s cheek tenderly. “Dearheart, know well I hold no anger against you. It is these others. All who have allowed you to fight alone the dark things of the nighttime, and mocked you when you warned them. This Barton, who no longer wears his aids of hearing. This Banner, who stares as a hungry man gloating over a feast, knowing he need only ask for you to part him from the Green One--for he must have the separation now, and only now, not when you are recovered, and the child strong within you-- caring no instant for the cost to you, my Loki.”

Thor straightened, Mjolnir now grasped tightly in his fist. “You, I exempt from my scorn, Lady Natasha, as you want naught and ask for naught, and have been a good friend this day to my poor brother.”

“What about me, Thor?” Steven asked of him, and beneath its usual tone of authority his voice trembled with restrained meaning.

“Bruce told me what happened, how your brother found Bucky and brought him here. You could say I’m more to blame than anyone for Loki’s current condition.”

Thor looked upon the Captain with something close to pity. “Truly, Steven, that was all my foolish, good-hearted Loki’s doing, you asked nothing of him. Yet I might well have wished you were not become so stern in these days, so unforgiving in your heart to one who was once your friend, who sought to prove himself unto you again and again by words and deeds only of goodness. You congratulate yourself that you supplied cold courtesy unto him, yet a hero might well have bestown true kindness, born from the courage of a forgiving heart.”

Thor raised Loki easily and gently to his feet, lifting him outright when he could not stand, and bore him away from the chamber of the Hulk Tank.

“I will cook dinner for you and my beloved nephews,” Thor said firmly. “For my sweet Lady Jane and dear Lady Pepper, also, if they will. We will eat and be merry in the company of one another, and after watch a film of Christmas that does not sadden you, my brother.”

“Thor, please, do not be very angry with Tony, or with the others,” Loki pleaded. "They did not…”

“For more than a year they injured your heart again and again, my brother, and only again discovered the least kindness when they might make use of you, like the heartless Santa, and his wicked deer, within the history of _Rudolph_. And I know that I have allowed such things in the past, through unkinder days, in our old home, but those days are behind us now, and I shall tolerate such behavior no more. Loki, you must allow me now to care for you, and you must also care for yourself, and wax strong again. Please, my brother, listen unto the wise words of Dr. Hank McCoy. Enjoy the growing of the child within, just as my Lady Jane enjoys the growing of our own younglings. Let yourself and the babe be full of joy, and well, shutting firmly the door on darker times.”

“For how long, my brother,” Loki asked, keying in the code for the penthouse door with painful slowness, scarcely able to see for the haze of emotion in his eyes, “Have you been so wise?”

Gently, Thor kissed the side of his head, just behind the spot where his right horn had been.

“If I am wise for you, my brother, will you be wise for me in return?" he replied, in a voice quite unlike his usual boisterous tones. "In this way, we shall keep each other in safety.”

“Always,” Loki rested his head on his brother’s powerful shoulder, thankful, just then, for the presence of only they two, with no others there to observe them. “Always, Thor.”


	5. Captain America, the Winter Soldier and the God of Mischief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve Rogers, past and present, or, the best Christmas present is the one you'll remember always.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> According to Marvel, Steve's parents were Irish immigrants. 
> 
> The Fianna are the warrior bands featured in the Fenian Cycle of Irish mythology and led by the legendary hero by Fionn mac Cumhaill (often Anglicized as Finn MacCool). The Fir Bolg (aka Firbolg and Fir Bholg) of medieval Irish mythology are the fourth group of people to settle in Ireland. At a past time, their ancestors, the Muintir Nemid left the Emerald Isle to scatter across Europe. The Fir Bolg came from the descendants who once settled in Greece, only to return to the now-uninhabited Ireland, where after some time they were overthrown by a supernatural race, the Tuatha Dé Danann (aka "the people of the goddess Dana" or "Tuath Dé"--tribe of the gods). The pantheon of the Tuatha Dé became the major gods of pre-Christian Ireland. One member of the tribe, Aengus, is thought to have been the god of love, youth and poetic inspiration, and was often depicted as having a circle of singing birds fluttering around his head. Another member, An Dagda is a somewhat Odin-like figure, the father, chieftain, and druid of the tribe. Cú Chulainn (aka Cú Chulaind or Cúchulainn and often Anglicized as Cucullain or Cuhullin) is another Irish hero, whose exploits are relayed in the Ulster Cycle. He was said to be both the son and the incarnation of Lugh, god of skill, crafts, the arts, oaths, truth, and the law.
> 
> _Siddhartha,_ Hermann Hesse's ninth novel, concerns the spiritual journey of a man named Siddhartha during the time of the Buddha. It was first published in the U.S. in 1951.

* * *

“Big boys don’t cry,” Steve’s mom always said to him, when he was young.

Maybe physical strength lay forever out of his reach, but Sarah Rogers’s son could always be brave. Any brute could be strong, Sarah told her son, but courage was a matter of character, and character was the mark of a real man.

Rogers men had character, Sarah said. Rogers men were brave.

After his Da died (and Steve didn’t cry), on those long nights when it was so cold in their Brooklyn walk-up that ice formed on the insides of all the windows and the chill made the frail little boy’s bones ache, Sarah and her Steven (named for St. Stephen, the first martyr) would huddle together on one bed, under their coats and all the covers in the apartment, and she would tell the stories her grandda and grandma once told her when she was small, of the far-away days, the days of the Fianna, the Fir Bolg, the Tuatha Dé Danann, of Aengus and The Dagda, of Cú Chulainn and Fionn mac Cumhaill, and all the other great gods and kings and heroes of the old country, the Emerald Isle, the land of his ancestors.

“Someday, mom, I’ll be a hero too,” Steve said to her.

“Steven, my darling son,” Sarah answered, “You are always a hero to me.”

Steve would practice being a hero when there wasn’t enough food for the two of them to eat. He especially practiced being a hero when he just couldn’t breathe, when he finally forced the air to go into his aching lungs, but once it finally went in it refused to go out again.

The not-breathing, strangely, hadn't felt very much like drowning, more like wanting badly just to drift off to sleep, an almost-wonderful, heavy-but-floating, drowsy, breathless feeling.

The easiest thing would have been to give in, but Steve didn’t, because he was a brave boy. Just like his mom said.

Steve remembered that feeling when the ice closed over him, and he hadn't been afraid. He understood what those difficult times had been: just practice. Just practice for _this_.

Even if it meant getting knocked down by bullies a thousand times a week, he'd been brave.

After all that, the one thing Steve honestly never expected of himself was that he’d become a bully too, or that he’d receive an apparently much-needed lesson in compassion from a warlike alien, an alien looking out for his little brother, just like Bucky had always looked out for him.

He could see handsome, smiling Bucky at Howard Stark’s Exhibition, charming Bucky with a girl on each arm, and his scrawny measly self tagging along, not that there was ever the least sense that Bucky did anything but welcome his company.

It wasn’t said back in those days, not between men, not even brothers, but Steve loved Bucky and Bucky loved Steve, and that was understood. Always. Never questioned.

A guy said, “He’s my buddy,” not, “Bucky, I love you more than anyone else in the world.”

But he did. More than even pretty, strong, brave Peggy Carter, truth be told, and Peggy was a swell girl. A really, really swell girl, and Steve liked her lots.

She just wasn’t Bucky.

Steve shook himself out of his thoughts, that sometimes caught and wrapped around him, sticky as spider-silk. Sometimes the temptation was great to stay there in the past, where things felt safe and comfortable, even when there was war, sadness and great evil. The present bustled, even though no one used that word anymore, except in irony.

Even in Union Station, in Washington, the graceful old lines of the building were cluttered with vending machines and flashing electronic notice boards. To buy his ticket back to New York, he couldn't go to a competent, knowledgeable ticket agent behind a neat counter, he had to puzzle out the incomplete and confusing instructions on a giant black box, feed it the Debit card Phil Coulson had helped him obtain, cross his fingers and hope he'd guessed right.

Steve wondered what the sorts of men who'd once become knowledgeable ticket agents did for jobs these days. Maybe they programmed the machines.

He wondered, too, why nobody smiled and nodded these days when they passed a stranger, yet thought it perfectly okay to stare fixedly at his khaki-clad bottom.

There at Union Station, Steve had stopped off for a cup of coffee at a little cart before he boarded his train (he liked trains, and was extremely glad they still existed). The young girl who made his coffee (she was called a "barista," Bruce had informed him) possessed purple hair with a flower pinned into it, reminding him a little of one of the pretty centaur girls in the movie _Fantasia_ , though of course her lower half was just as human as her upper half appeared to be. She smiled merrily as she made his coffee (grande cafe latte, whole milk, double pump of vanilla) and chatted a little. Maybe it was just for the tip (and Steve left a generous one in her tip-cup), but she seemed to genuinely like her job and meeting people all day long. Face-to-face. Not just as disembodied words on a cellphone screen.

It gave him hope of... something, in a world of people engrossed solely by those tiny phones. Dick Tracy's wrist-watch phone had seemed keen, back in his day, but the reality... wasn't.

The reality left people sad and lonely.

Steve had boarded his train to find the carriage nearly empty. He took a window seat, watching the buildings of D.C. slip away eventually to the flat, dreary Maryland suburbs, then to the countryside.

He couldn't believe it had only been that morning when Natasha called him.

“Cap,” she’d said, “I’m thinking you’ll want to get yourself back home. I’m not going into it on the phone. Just get yourself here, A.S.A.P, okay?”

A.S.A.P. meant “as soon as possible,” he’d learned, but Steve still didn’t understand why people were in such a hurry they couldn’t just say "as soon as possible.” It seemed so much more civilized.

There were questions he asked over and over. Why did everything have to move so quickly these days? Why did things have to be made fast, instead of skillfully and well? He’d never understand, not in a million years.

“But what, Natasha?” Steve prodded. “Is everyone all right?”

“Yeah. Mostly. Loki could be better, but everyone else is great.”

Steve hadn’t really cared about Loki, though, God help him. Loki was Tony’s problem, not his.

“I’ll be there, Natasha,” he said, closed up his suitcase, and went, leaving what he hoped was a thoughtful note for Sam and his family, thanking them for their hospitality and kindness to him.

It was the one thing (besides the truly, truly excellent coffee) he liked about this sometimes frightening, sometimes saddening new world, that he could celebrate Christmas with his friend and his friend’s loved ones, and no normal person minded in the least.

Their church, on Christmas Eve, wasn’t what he’d grown up with, but Steve had liked it very much, full of so much joy and feeling, with music that sent happy shivers up his backbone. Sam’s cousins teased him a little about the way he sang the familiar songs, but the teasing was only in fun and kindly meant.

Steve sighed, opened the book Bruce had given him, which was called _Siddhartha_ , and seemed to be all about the getting of maturity and wisdom. He tried to read, but the words kept slipping away from him until all he could think about was home, the tower, his friends, and what Natasha had and hadn’t said.

“Loki could be better,” she’d told him. Had Tony’s husband acted up? Gone off the reservation? Had the Avengers needed to forcibly take him down again?

Loki normally seemed so polite and subdued, gentle, sometimes even frightened, often big-eyed and overwhelmed, when Steve glimpsed him now and then in the corridors, or outside the tower, usually with his children clustered around him like goslings around a beautiful, wounded swan.

He’d become so unlike suave Captain Friggason, even unlike the wounded Capt. Friggason of the riverbank. He seemed so battered and so unwell, what with one thing or another, that Steve was surprised he could get up to anything much at all.

Unless it had all been a big trick. Unless he’d been faking this whole time, to lull them into a false sense of security. Loki was called the “trickster god,” wasn’t he?

Bruce phoned when Steve had arrived back in New York and caught a taxi, heading from Penn Station to Avengers Tower.

“Just so you know,” he said without preamble, “We’re all in the Hulk Tank antechamber. And when you’re able to join us, Cap, boy oh boy, have we got a surprise for you!”

Clint said something in the background, and Bruce hung up without another word, leaving Steve even more mystified than before.

The Hulk Tank antechamber, but obviously not an incident with The Hulk, since he’d just spoken with Bruce.

Steve paid for the taxi in a kind of daze.

Tony and Thor, with the two little boys, the chatty one and the quiet one, and the Asgardian’s sweet scientist lady-friend, came upon him while Steve waited for the elevator. They seemed happy, casual, talking about ice-skating at Rockefeller Center. Would they do that if Loki had gone wrong again? Steve really didn’t think so.

Then the boys talked about barns, but Steve didn't think the were really talking about _barns_ , the red buildings on farms, at all.

Steve's heart began to do a small, syncopated dance in his chest.

After a brief discussion, the boys and Dr. Foster were dispatched to the penthouse, while the two Avengers joined him in the elevator. They rode upstairs in silence. And then the elevator stopped,

Tony keyed open the Hulk Tank antechamber door, and Steve knew. Absolutely knew. Before he even properly saw, he knew.

Someone shoved a chair in behind him and Steve just dropped, as if he had legs made of water.

He didn’t want to be brave. He didn’t want to have character. He wanted to go against everything his mom ever said and cry and cry and cry, until he didn’t have a single tear left in him.

Bucky, there behind the heavy glass. His lost Bucky.

“Holy fucking shit,” Tony said, nearly laughing, though to Steve there wasn’t a single thing funny anywhere in the situation, least of all Tony's terrible language. Howard never had taught him to talk like that.

“It was my husband, wasn’t it?" Tony continued. "My fantastic crazy beautiful fucking husband.”

“What?” Steve said dully. He felt drained, and like he couldn’t breathe, and like he was shaking all over. Though he wasn’t. Not really. He was perfectly still.

Through the unbreakable glass, Bucky, who Steve loved best in all the world, glared at him in hate and rage from out of kohl-smeared eyes.

“Look, Steve,” Clint said dryly, “Loki decided to get you something special for Christmas.”

Things happened. Words were spoken. Hours passed.

* * *

Bucky had hunkered down in front of the glass. He seemed tired, maybe, and Steve supposed even insane, mind-controlled assassins needed to rest sometimes.

Steve wished devoutly, with his whole heart, that the Bucky across from him could suddenly turn again into the Bucky he knew, his buddy, the best friend a guy could ever have, that they could drink a beer together, or maybe a Coke, and laugh about this, because it had all just been one big mistake.

The Bucky in the Hulk Tank glared at him with eyes like razor wire.

He wondered if Bucky was even in there now, or if the something in the Winter Soldier that wouldn’t let Steve die had only been a trace, a wisp of the man who had been, nothing Steve would ever be able to hold onto.

Inside, he cried a lot, the way he’d taught himself, and been taught, tears upon tears, but none that ever showed. Steve never had wanted his mom to feel disappointed in her boy.

Behind him, the door opened and closed softly. Steve thought suddenly of Captain Friggason, so British and proper and brave, dying beside that unnamed German river with the sunrise shining in his bright green eyes.

“Ah, you knew it was I,” Loki said, just as proper as Captain Friggason ever thought of being. “I need not announce myself.” He lowered himself, stiffly, to the ground beside Steve’s chair.

“I can get up…” Steve began.

“No need.” Loki flashed his sweet, boyish smile and stretched out on the rough, gray carpeting until he was lying prone, legs crossed at the ankles. “I am not meant to be up and, see—as you are my witness, Steven—I am not up. Tony cannot chastise me.”

“Would that be considered cheating?” Steve asked.

“Quite possibly.” Loki shrugged and smiled, pure mischief in his grin. “Yet I am perfectly comfortable, and resting, so in this there can be no harm, at least. Everyone else in the tower is now asleep, and I require diversion.”

“And that’s me?”

Loki wriggled a little on the carpet to get comfortable, like a cat. “Forgive me, dearest Steven, if it disturbs you to hear, but as my body reacquaints itself with child-carrying, it stretches and bends within, in ways that are not always entirely pleasant. Thus, the need for diversion.”

“Because you’re in pain.”

“Yes,” Loki answered simply. For a while he seemed hypnotized by the ugly white… Steve supposed they could be called tiles on the ceiling overhead.

“Why, I wonder,” Loki said, “Do I know at a glance the exact number of holes on each tile on the ceiling above us, yet were I required to add two of those numbers, one with another, in my head, I could not do so to save the lives of my beautiful and much-loved children?” He shut one eye, squinting up at the tiles as if they offended him. “Yet again, if I look at the two as one, the number is instantly known to me.”

“What else do you know?” Steve asked.

Loki laughed. “All the words to ‘ _The Twelve Days of Christmas_.’ Jöri taught them unto me, and I was quizzed until perfect in my lessons. I confess I ran aground somewhat in the neighborhoods of ladies, lords and pipers. Oh, and with those Hel-bedamned drummers also. Pestilential creatures. If you would speak with him, Steven, to help you lies well within my power.”

The quick change in subject nearly gave Steve whiplash. “Drummers…?” he mumbled, trying to catch up with his companion’s quicksilver train of thought.

“No, old friend.” Loki smiled indulgently. “With James. Your brother. Bucky, as you call him. Some cruel foe, by wicked agency has, I assume, entombed his true and honest mind within a second, false and violent one, like a stone of gold within a poisonous peach. It is yet too soon to tear away the false mind entire, as such requires work and careful thought, yet I ought to be able to nudge a passage open for a bit, long enough that James might know and see you clearly, taking heart from your presence, and that you might take solace also from converse with your friend.”

“You could help me talk to Bucky? To the real Bucky?” Steve stared down on the what-seemed-like-acres of Loki stretched out along the carpet, his hair in cropped black curls around his head, at the wide, violet eyes gazing back at him, and all of a sudden a second memory of Captain Lo Friggason on the riverbank struck him so hard it nearly knocked Steve over.

Captain Friggason unconscious, nearly done for (or so he’d thought, not being familiar with the good Captain’s particular brand of resilience), how he’d bent over and…

Steve blushed crimson, unable to help himself.

He’d bent over and pressed his lips to Captain Friggason’s lips, and for a moment the whole world narrowed to that alone, the softness against his own mouth, and the Captain’s scent, which was somehow like ice, and cloves, and a breath of evergreens in a snowy wood.

“You smell a little bit like Christmas,” Steve had whispered, when at last he pulled back.

Captain Friggason’s mouth curved into the faintest of grins. His hand groped for Steve’s and held it fast, and somehow it didn’t matter that he’d kissed his friend, his comrade-in-arms, thinking he’d been asleep, when Captain Friggason had really been awake, and known.

“Myrddin, your Welsh girl, isn’t a girl, is… uh… he?” Steve had asked. He wasn’t shocked, or disgusted, the way he’d been taught he ought to have been. Captain Friggason wasn’t anything like the ugly jokes, the ugly words for people like him. He was tough, strong, courageous--almost insanely so--unselfish, kind. He was exactly the way he was meant to be, Steve realized, perfect in himself.

And if that was so, then maybe…

“I’m in love with Bucky,” he’d confessed. “I have been ever since we were boys.”

Captain Friggason gripped his hand just a little tighter, with probably the last strength he had.

“Steven,” he breathed out, so kind, so loving. It had been the last thing he said.

In the morning, he passed, just as Steve had glanced away, to watch the sun rise in clouds of pink, vermilion and gold above the river.

He’d felt then as if he cried for hours, despite everything his mom ever said. Maybe it wasn’t so long, but Steve felt like it had been.

He’d wanted to bury his friend, but before Steve even finished grieving, the Nazis came again, and there was fighting.

There was always fighting, anywhere he went.

"My poor dear Steven,” said the Loki of the present. “Why should you have grieved for me so? I am nothing. It shames me to think that I hurt you, then or now.”

Steve said, almost bitterly, “So what did you do, sit up the minute I ran away, pluck the shrapnel out of your chest, zap the Nazis and have a good laugh at my expense?”

“Oh, Steven,” Loki said sadly. “Why should I do so, my respected friend? Truly, I was most grievously hurt, and needs must slip into what we term _Litli Dauða_ , “The Little Death’—which Shakespeare uses to denote the state of orgasm, but in this case means what Tony might call a state of suspended animation, or coma. I most certainly might have suffered _Mikill Dauði_ —The Great Death—indeed, had not Thor, my dearest brother, come to me against the Allfather’s will, bringing Eir, chief of Asgardian Healers. Even so, I was many days recovering.”

For a while they sat, and lay, in silence, watching as Bucky’s face slowly relaxed, softened, until it looked almost peaceful. His angry eyes slipped shut.

“I lull him,” Loki said. “I will be easier to access the inner mind if the outer is quiet.”

“This doesn’t buy my friendship, you know,” Steve told him.

“Such was not my intent,” Loki answered, sounding weary himself. “I know well affection is not a purchasable commodity.”

“It also doesn’t excuse your actions, Loki.”

“No.” Loki sat up suddenly, hugging his knees to his chest. “Whatever will?” He sighed, coughed a little, holding his ribs, rubbed his forehead. “

As you know, whilst in S.H.I.E.L.D.’s custody, I drew very near to death. You know not that I was visited, actually, by a Death. By a Blessed Death, in fact. A Blessed Death comes to one when the end of one’s life is a blessing, when there is no other choice but to go. Her door became tangible within my cell, and the temptation to allow her to open it for me seemed all but overwhelming. I believe the only thing that prevented my leaving was that the Blessed Death sent was my own sweet Hela, and seeing her face I desired badly to see her grow to be a woman. Yet how I wished, in the early days of this winter that I had not been my ever-stubborn self and had gone after all. I cling unto my family as a drowning man might cling to a billet of wood, but what is the point if no atonement is allowed, ever, for all my life? If I am never to be forgiven? I search and search within my mind to comprehend some plan I might have better spun, some resource inside myself I might have brought forth to resist the will of those wicked, powerful beings.

“Steven, when I fell from the Bifrost, I fell in utter disillusionment, utter loss. I was nothing. I had nothing, not even myself: no family, no heritage, no honor, no truth, no love, no hope. My body dropped into the abyss and was shattered, and then I had not even the strength of my corporeal form. I ask myself again and again, do I only make excuses? Am I truly only wicked and weak-willed, unable to resist that which any other might have cast-off? The only answer I can find for myself is that I no longer know. I know not even what I am: not _Ӕsir_ , not _Jötunn_ , not true man, not woman, only some freakish thing that crawls beneath the sun. If you believe, in the truth of your heart, that I have escaped justice and my life ought to be forfeit for what I have done, then so be it.

"I ask only that you allow my child his safe birth, and then I am yours. Otherwise, I beg you, dear Captain, by the God you and my best-loved Kurt hold dear, allow me to be forgiven at last.”

Loki leaped to his feet and started to pace in a way that wasn’t pacing at all, but more Loki’s body flinging itself through numerous rips in the air and stumbling out the other side. For the first time, Steve truly felt frightened, partly because Loki seemed so strange to him, then, so entirely alien, and partly because the one-time god looked so distraught, and so very frail, Steve was truly afraid he’d hurt himself.

“Loki!” Steve called out, leaping up from his chair. “Please, Loki, you don’t need to get this upset. Just come back and talk to me.”

With more luck than timing he managed to catch hold of Loki in the middle of his wild motion, swinging him around and back to the chair he’d abandoned. For a few minutes, Loki's arms felt iron-hard under Steve’s hands, as if he wanted badly to fight back, or maybe just lash out randomly at anything in his path, just to relieve weeks and months of pent-up feelings.

His breathing had gone ragged.

Gradually, Loki’s muscles loosened, his hands relaxed in his lap. Tears stood in his violet eyes, but didn’t spill.

“Loki?” Steve said.

“Forgive me,” Loki said softly, tiredly. “That was unnecessary. Tony says I should exercise better control over my emotions. I do try. At times.”

Steve took a seat beside him on the floor. Not quite sure what he was doing, but doing it anyway, he leaned his head on Loki’s knee. After a moment, Loki’s hand moved to rest on his hair. A moment longer, and Loki’s long, slender fingers began to comb softly through, the most loving and gentle touch Steve had felt in years.

Inside the Hulk tank, Bucky had fetched the two blue pillows and the red, white and blue comforter from the bed, bringing them up close to the glass, where he now slept on the floor in a nest of his own devising. His face, showing above the edge of the blanket, looked peaceful and still. Loki may have lost control of his own emotions, but he hadn’t lost an inch of control over whatever he was doing for Bucky.

“He is quiet,” Loki assured Steve, “In his mind. He will rest well, for he is truly weary. To be of two minds gives no peace whatsoever.”

Loki knew, Steve realized, still staring through the glass of the Hulk Tank at the man he loved.

Memories, of times both hard and good, seemed to flicker like images on a television screen over the impenetrable pane. Steve had seen that tank actually hold The Hulk, only the slightest trace of gentle, self-effacing Bruce left in those contorted green features. Those huge fists thundering on the glass, which couldn’t possibly hold, yet somehow did. Whatever else he might be—and Steve didn’t really mean that badly, or didn’t think he did—Tony was undeniably a whizz-bang engineer, even better than his father had been. He’d seen the tank hold Loki, too, the tall, thin, so-called god sitting on the floor with a muzzle over his mouth and his arms encased halfway to the elbow in restraining gauntlets, the deep bruises and gashes fading slowly, bit by bit, from his face.

When Loki had thought no one was out there watching, a dull, dead, despairing look came into his eyes. When he knew someone was outside…

Steve had wondered at the time. He’d even thought of asking Thor, though he hadn’t in the end.

Why does Loki unwatched looked weary and desperately sad? he’d wanted to say. While Loki with an audience paces, and sneers, all cutting wit and crackling high-tension energy.

Steve understood now. Loki was a consummate actor, perhaps always had been. It went hand-in-hand with his flawless shape-shifting abilities, was maybe even part of them. Loki gave people what they wanted, what they expected to see in him.

It wasn’t necessarily meant to be devious, or sneaky. Loki could be very devious (witness the sudden presence of one Winter Soldier in their tower), but not really in a malicious way, that Steve had seen.

Only, if there was a regular way to do something, and a Loki way, the Loki way would have twelve extra steps and a giant flourish at the end.

The whole point, though, of the acting was that was how Loki protected himself, in the physical world, and in the emotional. Most mornings, returning from his run, Steve glimpsed Loki heading off to work at the university, so clearly immersed in his role he might as well have had the words “Brilliant College Professor” emblazoned on his chest as clearly as the star on the front of Steve’s uniform.

With all of the Avengers he was unfailingly polite, pleasant, slightly formal, nearly always adopting an open stance, hands at his sides whenever possible, eyes lowered, head bent a little, as if that would take away from his height and make him seem less formidable.

Loki accepted the barbs the others tossed at him because he’d been ordered to, it was the cost of him living on earth and not Asgard—and there were barbs in plenty, especially from Bruce, sometimes so vicious Steve found he’d moved himself physically away from the normally-gentle physicist, as if that cruelty might be catching.

Still, Steve realized, he’d rarely spoken up, and never with any heat or authority, not even when his teammates practiced their put-downs in front of Loki’s children.

_Tony rarely speaks up either_ , Steve had told himself, which was true, but didn't make his own actions right.

At most, Tony would say something humorous, like, “My god, you guys, someday my hubby’s going to snap and smite your sorry asses from here to Timbuktu, and the cleaning service will have to wipe you off the walls, like ketchup off the walls of a high school cafeteria after a food fight,” which was nothing like the same thing as saying the behavior was forbidden, off limits, no go.

Thor, who was often absent, simply hadn’t known, Steve suspected. Which left only outsiders—Loki’s mutant friends, The Wolverine and the charming young blue man (who even though German-born was by nature as far from Steve’s Nazi foes as a fellow could possibly get), the one who’d helped them at Castle Doom--to regularly speak up for him. As situations went, it would have been hard for anyone who wasn’t a doormat, and Loki was clearly no doormat.

Steve could tell though, Loki wanted very much to be liked, and knew, in that respect he’d badly let down his old comrade-in-arms. Earlier in the day, the others had wondered aloud, “What in hell possessed him?” and “What made him do it?”

Natasha had come closest when she’d commented, “Hmn, Steve, looks like someone brought you a peace offering.”

“Close, but no cigar,” though, as Nick Fury liked to say. Loki really hadn’t brought Bucky to him as a peace offering, or a bribe, because Loki was better than that.

He’d brought him because he knew Steve felt lonely, and out of place, and wanted him to have a Merry Christmas.

It was one of the most extraordinarily kind things anyone had ever done for him.

“Steven, it was always my intent to make you happy,” Loki said, his hand brushing, warm and gentle, over Steve’s cheek. He seemed amazed Steve would even wonder that it was so.

“Listen now,” Loki said. "Shut your eyes, my friend."

Behind the glass, Bucky slept. Steve’s real, true Bucky, the one he loved, his buddy, his friend.

Bucky dreamed, and Steve shared his dreams, of two young boys running, hand-in-hand, down a Brooklyn street, on a bright, bright day in the springtime.

Of Steve running as hard as he could, and Bucky always, always waiting, never going on without him.

Steve loved Bucky, and Bucky loved Steve.

And they were happy.


	6. Best Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three sets of best friends--Steve and Bucky, Tony and Bruce, Kurt and Loki--three conversations.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Film history alert! In the 1939 Buck Rogers serial. Buck and his young sidekick Buddy are forced to crash their airship in the Arctic. To survive until rescue, they inhale Nirvano gas, which sends them into suspended animation. 500 years pass before they are rescued by scientists. The similarities were not lost on me...
> 
> When Oprah Winfrey had her network show, she'd now and then give away giant piles of her favorite stuff to the audience members.
> 
> Sad clowns, big-eyed children and dogs playing poker are the holy trinity of kitchy paintings.
> 
> Contrary to stereotype, not all Swedes have blonde hair and blue eyes. There are indeed black-haired, green-eyed Swedes, of which my father was one.
> 
> Musical greats Jimi Hendrix and John Bonham (drummer of Led Zeppelin) both choked to death while intoxicated, and that's as specific as I intend to get.
> 
> _hjarta hjarta hans_ =heart of his heart
> 
> Kurt is quoting Ruth's words to Naomi, from Ruth 1:16 KJV. "Intreat" is the archaic KJV version of entreat.

* * *

Steve woke to someone tugging, gently but insistently, on the leg of his khakis.

“Steven.” Tug, tug. “Steven, if you please…”

He cracked an eye. The person calling him had to be Loki, somehow down on the floor again, while he’d been asleep in the chair. Had Loki changed their positions? He must have.

Only, glancing down, Steve saw Loki curled up on the carpet again, deeply asleep, his long legs tucked up against his chest, long arms holding them tight. As sleeping positions went, that one looked neither relaxed nor comfortable, and Loki seemed tired even as he slept, his pale skin nearly translucent.

_You never should have let him stay like this_ , Steve chided himself. _Honestly, what were you thinking?_

“Is he okay?” a voice asked, all at once so familiar, and so strange Steve actually felt dizzy for a minute, thoroughly lost in time. “The guy. The magician. Is he okay? He doesn’t _look_ okay.”

God help him, Steve forgot about Loki completely.

Bucky. This was _his_ Bucky. Not merely a childhood afternoon remembered, in the sweetness of a long-lost springtime, but the real deal. His living, grown-up friend.

Steve rushed to the glass, he couldn’t help himself. Rushed to the glass and slapped his hands against the big, solid pane, pushing and pushing as if he could somehow push right through and be inside with his friend. As if he could hug Bucky tight and just hold him, hold him, until he became one hundred per cent certain he would never, ever, ever feel this lonely again.

Because he couldn’t do it anymore, he couldn’t.

Maybe he was Captain America and “couldn’t” wasn’t supposed to be in his vocabulary, but this time, in just this instance Steve really couldn't help himself, because he may have been Captain America, a Super Soldier, a hero, but he was also just as weak, as fallible, as human, as any other human being.

Bucky’s hands pressed to the glass just opposite his: the human hand of flesh and blood; the artificial hand of silver-dull metal. Bucky had wiped nearly all of the black gunk off from around his eyes. His face was paler and more gaunt than in the old days, but his smile shone bright and warm.

“Whoa, buddy, whoa,” he said gently. “Stevie, no. Stevie, don’t cry. It’ll be okay. It’ll be all right. Don’t cry.”

“I’m not,” Steve wanted to say, but he _was_ crying. Absolutely, without a doubt. In front of anyone else he would have felt deeply shamed, but not in front of Bucky.

“I saw you before in your uniform, all star-spangled and handsome. Just look at you, buddy! Where’s Little Stevie now, huh?”

“Inside me,” Steve managed to get out. He wanted to beg and plead with Bucky not to go away again, not to leave him.

He pressed his forehead into the glass, eyes shut tight and muscles clenched, as if he could hold back the inevitable by force of strength, or force of will. “Please don’t go again, Buck,” he whispered. “Please.”

“Steve, don’t be silly,” Bucky told him. “I’m always here, even when you see him instead of me. You just have to stay sharp. He’s not a good guy, so you don’t let him out of here for anything, and that means you don’t let me out either, not even if the building’s on fire, you got that, Stevie? This really is a pretty swell place, what’s it meant to hold, a rhinoceros?”

“A monster, actually,” Steve told him, his mind’s eye seeing The Hulk’s fists beat against the glass again, in the place where the print of Bucky’s human hand showed clearly.

“Huh. Monsters and magicians. Interesting new world you’ve got here, Stevie.” When they grinned at each other, the old times came back again, seventy years and all the strangeness of their lives wiped away like nothing.

This time Steve touched the glass with his fingertips only, and Bucky matched him, finger for finger.

“He will be back soon, Steve,” his best friend said softly. “The other guy . You know that, right?”

Steve thought of Bruce calling The Hulk, “The Other Guy.” How each of them, heroes all, had their separate, darker selves: Bruce with The Hulk, Clint and Natasha with their vague assassin pasts, Tony with his drinking, Thor with his history of complying with wicked acts out of misplaced loyalty, a warrior as Steve was a soldier, so used to following orders, saying, “Sir, yes, sir!” it made him gullible, sometimes even made him weak.

Was that the flaw they’d exploited in Bucky, too, Steve wondered. That inability to question?

Then there was Loki, called a villain, with his deep well of rage and need, made of questions, forever trying to balance, juggle, dance, ten steps ahead of the competition.

Loki planning an invasion designed to fail, big enough to get attention, too small to prosper, all outrageous words, outrageous acts that screamed, _Look at me! Look at me!_ That practically begged for television coverage.

Until the team had drawn together.

Until The Hulk had been released.

Steve remembered when the casualty numbers came in after the invasion, asking Tony, “Did someone leave off a zero? Or two?”

“Fuck, or three,” Tony answered, with his customary earthiness. “What ‘n hell was that bastard up to, Steve? Did he flunk out of the Asgard Military Academy or come in at the head of his class? I keep getting the weirdest feeling we were just somehow played, but I can’t get to the why or the how.”

Steve recalled a far later date, Tony and Loki’s wedding, Clint (forced to attend, apparently at gunpoint, by Natasha) pulling on his sleeve.

“Steve! Steve! Check out Loki!”

Loki, resplendent in a tuxedo worthy of the Golden Age of Hollywood, embraced a sweet-faced elderly lady, then a grumpy-faced elderly man.

“Steve, over there. With Loki. Do you know who that is?” Clint hissed.

Steve hadn’t the slightest idea. “Ah… A celebrity? A political figure?”

“God, Steve, look again. That’s Angry Death-Camp Survivor. Y’know, from Stuttgart. The, ‘There are always men like you’ Dude? And over there…” Clint grabbed Steve’s shoulders to rotate him a quarter turn. “Talking to Tony? That’s Melon-balled-Eyeball Guy. No lie. Go introduce yourself. Tell him you’re glad he and both his totally-intact eyes could make it to the festivities.”

Ten minutes later, Steve returned to his teammate’s side.

“Do you know what a hologram projector is?”

“Yeah,” Clint said. “From a vaguish _Star Wars_ sort of perspective.

_Star Wars_ was a movie, or series of movies, Steve knew. He had it written down on his list called, "Movies You Need to See So You'll Understand What Others Are Saying."

He remembered Loki snapping crankily to Tony, just the other day, "I know not this _Star Wars_! Why must you always speak of this _fjandinn_ _Star Wars_?"

The movie had aliens, Steve knew. And, also, more gadgets than a _Buck Rogers_ serial, by which it was at least partially inspired. He was glad, at least (unlike his near-namesake), he'd only been frozen for seventy years, not five hundred. If he felt lost now, how lost would he have felt sleeping half a millenia away?

How he and Bucky had laughed at the silliness of that story!

“Um... Earth to Steve?" Clint said.

"Anyway, that’s what the supposed melon-baller was. If you were watching us a minute ago, the reason Tony laughed so hard was that he invented the darn thing—it had the Stark Industries logo printed right on the side--but got so caught up in the moment he was just as fooled as anyone else. It seems Dr. Schäfer and Herr Mendelssohn both enjoy amateur theater as a hobby and are wartime friends of Loki’s. Also, the viridium vault door was coded to open when it did, and the vault was stocked with low-grade viridium in order to ensure a small-sized portal.

“In other words, Tony was right, Loki did play us. Like violins. Played me worst of all, ‘cause I was sure I was serving unspeakable evil. Which was all the point, wasn’t it? The disgust. The hate. The Villain-with-a capital-V.”

“The notoriety,” Steve murmured, watching Loki perform a gentle but highly elegant foxtrot with sweet-faced Frau Mendelssohn.

Clint followed his gaze. “That too. Guy confuses me, y’know. He’s elusive. Just when I think I’ve got him pegged, he slips away.”

Steve didn’t think that was true anymore. He thought Loki left obvious clues. He thought, if anything, he put too much trust in human beings. Maybe the Vikings, with their riddles and complicated metaphors, had been smarter, or at least less distracted than modern men, forever scurrying around peering into their tiny phones.

“He’s a good kid, Stevie,” Bucky said. "You know, your magician? A solid kid. It’ll all come out. He’ll take care of me. Don’t worry, buddy. Don’t worry.”

“Sure, Buck.” Steve glanced over his shoulder at tall, ethereally thin Loki, who looked anything but solid, curled up on the dull carpet.  "Whatever you say.”

When he turned back, the razor-wire sharpness had returned to Bucky’s eyes, and his friend was nowhere to be seen.

_How many time can a heart break_ , Steve wondered, staring at the Winter Soldier, _Before there’s nothing to stick it back together again?_

* * *

Bruce didn’t have a lot of experience with babies. Okay, he’d once converted a disused theater popcorn machine into an impromptu incubator for the Spawn of Loki when they were teacup-sized, but that was about as far as it went. He’d felt younger then, and kinder, though he wasn’t sure why. Maybe because the three had grown so much since that time, running around now being charming and adorable, with great, big personalities all their own, making him kind of love them, though he hadn’t meant to.

Even Hela, who seriously (yet somehow sweetly) had threatened to kill him if he kept messing with her _Pabbi_.

Maybe because they were Tony’s kids too now, right? Tony’s kids. Wasn’t that almost required, liking the kids of your best friend, the closest thing you’d ever had, or would ever have, to a brother?

Sometimes it seemed like for every step the Happy Three rushed ahead in their young lives, he himself took two steps backward. He honestly tried to treat the kids right, to be good ol’ Uncle Bruce to them, but it’s not easy to feed bullcrap to children who can read your every thought, especially three kids who seriously, seriously loved their _Pabbi_.

As a result, Jöri acted timid around Bruce, and in his presence always shapeshifted to look one hundred per cent human, no blue tongue, no scales, no second eyelids, nothing (and then, noticing his radically-altered little boy, Loki would get all tragic-looking, and there went the evening).

Hela, who Tony called his "Childlike Empress," deigned to be regally, distantly gracious with him, so that talking to her felt like seeking an audience with a kid version of Queen Elizabeth I, as portrayed by Dame Judi Dench.

Little Fen, who by this point had learned to say everyone’s name quite nicely, called him “Boo Badder.” Considering Fen could now enunciate “Natasha Romanov” with British-accented clarity, Bruce took that for the editorial comment it was clearly meant to be.

Needless to say, he wasn’t exactly anyone else’s number one choice for babysitter, either, for obvious reasons. He might have saved the lives of a few sick babies in developing countries, but other than that he could barely look after his own needs.

He’d heard tell, though, that if a baby just wouldn’t settle, its parents sometimes ran the dishwasher or the vacuum, and the loud, steady hum, weirdly, calmed the little ones right down.

And maybe, Bruce figured, he'd been wired the same way, like a big middle-aged baby, because when he got stressed (short of Hulk-level), he liked to break out the shiny Dyson-Ball vacuum Tony had given to him, and each of their teammates, as one of their moving-in gifts (it had been like an Oprah's Favorite Things giveaway, only more extravagant and technology-heavy) and run it all around his apartment until not a dust mite remained.

Boo Badder, Slayer of Dust, that was him. Or, “that was he,” as Loki would no doubt have corrected him.

The vacuuming frenzy was how he discovered his poor jade plant (still with the one ironic red bauble) could use a good dusting, with, probably, an equally good misting to follow.

His sole houseplant’s meant-to-be-plump leaves looked vaguely shriveled, its stems weary. He’d brought an all-but-indestructible succulent to the point of looking elderly and sad. He was so not to be trusted with living things.

In the course of discovering just how much of a green thumb he lacked, Bruce also found the package leaned up against the jade plant’s stoneware pot. A package with shiny Loki-green paper and a white ribbon with an elaborate gold-and-white bow. Though flat, it was fairly good-sized, maybe twenty-four by twenty, and medium-heavy.

Presumably Loki’s gift, brought by delivery-elf Kurt, as described. It felt like a painting. Probably a Loki original. Oh, joy.

Maybe he could sell it, at least, for a lot of money. He was doing better, the last couple days, in the unreasonable-hatred-of-Tony’s-husband department, but that didn’t mean he needed to a keepsake to remember him by, necessarily.

So what was it going to be? A sad clown? A big-eyed child? Dogs playing poker? Actually, any of the above would be pretty damn funny, a nice (and no doubt well-deserved) “fuck you, Bruce” on Loki’s part, but Bruce suspected, although Loki might well appreciate the mischief of such a gesture, his brain didn’t work that way.

Also, from what Tony said, gift giving, to him, was like communion to a Catholic—not something to be messed around with, ever.

He almost just shoved the thing into the closet, for future drop off at Goodwill or the charity of his choice—what a nice surprise for them to get an original Lo Stark (New York’s Number One New Artist to Watch!) in their donation bin.

Except curiosity got the better of him, the way it always did. Bruce had to look.

Two hours later he hadn't stopped looking. The vacuum continued to stand in the middle of his living room, and Bruce’s throat felt sore, his nose congested, his eyes raw and wet.

Loki had painted his mom. His beautiful, gentle, loving and much-loved mom, Rebecca.

More than that, Loki had not painted the tense, unhappy-looking woman, dressed to the nines and stiffly posed, in the two photos Bruce possessed of her. This was a picture of his _real_ mom, the lovely lady like a young queen in a fairytale, who bent over him when he had a bad dream in the night, or who turned to him just after playing a Gershwin tune on the piano.

Here was her lustrous dark hair, her warm, chocolate-brown eyes with their long lashes, her welcoming smile (with that one tooth at the front, even, just slightly ever-so-slightly out of true), the dimples at the corners of her mouth and the… the _something_ , the beautiful, undefinable something that made her perfectly Rebecca, perfectly mom, truly so lovely and so lovable, his protector, his confidant, his fellow-sufferer, his dear, dear friend.

Bruce never thought he’d see that face again. Never.

Seeing something he’d thought lost forever nearly broke him.

It struck him how sensitive Loki had been, not only to be able to paint this miraculous picture, to not only see, but understand, the image in his head, but to have Kurt bring the gift here, to his own apartment, because to open it, to see that face for the first time in the company of others, even his teammates and friends, might actually have destroyed him.

A couple minutes later a knock came on his door. Tony, he guessed—of course it was, who else would give a “shave and a haircut, two bits” knock?

It was actually an example of his best friend being unusually sensitive, too. Usually Tony just did an override on his door code and barged in.

Bruce gave his face a quick wipe with his sleeve for good measure and opened up.

“Hey.” Tony was leaning on the jamb. “Emotional weather report said you might want a friend?”

“Does your husband spy on all of us _all_ the time? That must get tiring.”

“Give my baby a break,” Tony said, cheerfully enough. “He pulled his face out of the toilet to let me know. Be ever-thankful, as I am, that you will never know the joys of morning sickness, Bruce.”

He wandered into the room, flinging himself down on the near end of the couch in an attitude of ultimate relaxation. “Dude, this room oppresses me. What do you call this decorative style, ‘Modern First-Year-of-Grad-School Poverty?’”

“Not all of us can be a—what was it?—Billionaire-Jerkwad-Playboy-Asshole. The rest of us have to be unhappily unemployed because we turn into big green rage monsters.”

“Fuck, Brucie, why didn’t you say? You help me all the time, you should be on the S.I. payrolls, with bennies and retirement. And what about your Avengers salary?”

“Garnished.”

“What?” Tony sat bolt-upright. “Why?”

“The Big Guy messes stuff up, people want me to pay for it.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake!” Tony flung himself back into the cushions, both hands slapping over his eyes. “Do you people think I made some poor beleaguered intern go through the inconvenience of printing up physical copies of the Avengers Employee Handbook because I like killing trees and for the sake of my health—knowing full well you morons would never figure out to check the digital copy? A cursory skimming of the table of contents, even, would have shown you we have insurance. Our own company, even? It covers all personal and property claims related to Avengers activities, the attack on New York, and other high risk ventures. We branched out. Scrape together the papers from your no-doubt lousy filing system and shoot them to my P.A. She’ll be sure it gets handled. Sheesh.”

“I feel kind of dumb now.”

“You’re an idiot. But I love you. My price for saving you from your own stupidity is that you let me send in my decorator. For real. On me. Truly, Bruce, this place makes Ikea weep.” He grinned, his eyes getting nostalgic. “In grad school, I dated this Swedish girl—fuck, she was hot. And European. Very, very European. Tall, that fair Nordic skin, green, green eyes…”

“If your next words are ‘black hair,’ I’m going to yell ‘Lady Loki!’”

“Oh, fuck,” Tony said laughing, “Jet-black hair.”

“Lady Loki!”

“Okay, okay, you got me, bro. Anyway, this smokin’-hot Swedish girl, who completely coincidentally resembled my current and forever husband, could build Ikea furniture like a superpower, like flat-pack to bookshelf in under five minutes. She could even do it drunk. I mean, force beams out the eyes, controlling the weather, that’s nothing…”

Tony shook his head, giving a low, slow whistle. “Ingegärd Lundquist, wherever you are, I salute you and your amazing abilities. All of them.”

“Umn, Tony…” Bruce began cautiously, remembering the previous day. “Speaking of Loki—and much as I enjoy your company--maybe you shouldn’t…”

“Abandon my husband to drown in the loo or expire of starvation face-down on the carpet? Yeah, I got the whole story--Clint, the church, Bucky, the big crash yesterday, everything. After Thor and I retrieved my busy boy from sleeping on the carpet in the Hulk Tank Antechamber with Steve—I mean in the room with Steve, not sleeping with Steve—Mr. Good Intentions and I had a little cross-porcelain-throne conference time in the wee hours this morning. Later, Hank stopped by, and then Kurt, who’s with Loki now, trying this kind of soothing Vulcan mind-meld thing with him to see if he can’t help my poor baby stop puking for five seconds. He knows he fucked up bad, for the best of all possible reasons, and I think he’s scared as much as anything else. Kurt will calm him down again. With me he just kept asking these SpaceViking women about cut threads. Crazy talk, poor thing. Hank has him back on the I.V.”

“Um… Tony, you’re married to a damn Norse god and you don’t know word one about Norse mythology?”

“Never saw the point, I guess. Loki will tell me the real parts—like the horse story that everyone laughs about, that isn’t remotely funny. It’s horrible, and sad. The rest is mostly bullshit with a pro-Odin spin. I hope Hela takes the Allfucker down hard. She’s probably discussing the concept of constitutional monarchy with the _AlÞhingi_ —don't laugh, it's the parliament of Asgard—behind Odin’s back as we speak.”

Bruce wouldn’t claim to be an expert, by any means, but all those art history lessons had shown him enough images of the women who spun, and cut threads. He knew that Loki was actually praying, and who he was praying to, why, and for whom.

Poor baby, indeed. For once, Bruce felt genuinely sorry.

Silence followed, a fairly long one, though they were too good of friends by this time to have it feel awkward.

“Loki doesn’t spy on anyone, you know,” Tony said, picking up the thread of an earlier tangent. "I mean, he could... but he doesn't. It really is like a weather report, like an unmanned station taking in data, or like kind of an ambient thing, like feeling how warm or cold a room is with your skin. I imagine he’d shut it off if he could. Think how it was for him going around Asgard all the time, feeling how much everyone hated him. It’s enough to give a kid a complex. Come to think of it, think how it’s been for him living here? No wonder he loves hanging out at the Boys and Girls’ Club. Those kids think he’s the bomb.”

“Okay, point taken.” Bruce jumped up off the couch, pretending he was neither running away nor changing the subject. “Coffee, Tone? I need coffee.”

“You know me, Bruce. There are certain questions to which I will never answer no.” Tony pulled himself out of his cushion-surrounded slump, picked up the painting and turned it left and right, studying the image from different angles. “Your mom was a beautiful lady, Bruce.”

Bruce returned to the couch with two mugs, one coffee straight-up black for Tony, one revoltingly sweet and creamy for himself. He usually tried to exercise a little self-control, but today he figured he deserved the treat.

“That she was,” he said.

“I can see, just by looking, why you loved her so much. I feel like I could talk to her and tell her all my secrets.”

“Yes.” Bruce sipped his coffee, which was disgusting and completely delicious.

Tony drank from his own cup, which being undiluted must have been boiling hot. He made the grimace he always made with his first drink of coffee of the day, a combination of pure joy and undeniable pain.

“My dad taught me to drink it black,” he said suddenly, as if answering an unanswered question. "I’ve never been able to take it any other way. ‘Women drink tea,’ he told me—this in front of Jarvis, who drank tea the way I used to drink scotch—‘Women drink coffee with cream and sugar.’”

“Ah, a misogynist and a coffee snob,” Bruce said. “What a guy!”

Tony laughed. “’Men drink coffee straight-up black.’ Always those words, ‘Straight-up black.’ The only allowable beverages for a man were water, orange juice with breakfast, black coffee, beer, scotch, dry martini. No exceptions allowed. Howard probably would have called James Bond a wuss because he put vodka in his martinis instead of gin.”

“And James Bond would have pulled out his license to kill and his gun, shot Howard in the eye, and everyone would have gone home happy.”

Tony laughed again. “Yeah, you’re probably right. Or not. See, I never know, because I spend half my time hating every single thing Howard stood for, and the other half wanting to emulate him, follow his rules, gain his approval. The man’s been worm-food for thirty-odd years and I still want his approval, Bruce. I lack your purity of vision. The worst thing is, I bring him into my marriage, which absolutely sucks. Did I ever tell you about Myrddin, Loki’s first husband?”

“I didn’t know Loki had a first husband.”

“Not Midgard-legally, of course, back in the day, but they were married in any way that counts. Sherlock’s father, this would be. You know what Myrddin is Welsh for?”

Bruce shook his head.

“Merlin. But of course we’re not talking any old dude named Merlin, not for my Loki. We’re talking actual Merlin the Fucking Magician of Motherfucking Camelot. He had red eyes, Bruce. Ruby red. Crimson, even. Scarlet? He was a fifteen hundred-year old goddamn sorcerer with scarlet eyes, and he found me so disgusting he sucked me into the fucking wizard afterlife and double-cursed me for the way I treated Loki. One, that every time I made a nasty remark about or to him, it would be like a razor blade cut into my tongue.

"For a taste, he gave me that day’s share cumulatively. I had blood bubbling out of my mouth, Bruce, I’d said so much crappy stuff. And, yeah, he’d manipulated me into a lot of it, what with some mind games, and some unexpected truths revealed, etcetera, etcetera, and maybe I wouldn’t have said the shit I said otherwise, but it was also totally in character that I might have. Witness this fall and winter. Yeah, I can blame J.A.R.V.I.S., but he just took what already there and ran with it—I am an alcoholic, furthermore a mean drunk, I’m completely shut-up impaired, also tactless, and when people commit the great sin of loving me, I set out to destroy them, because how stupid could they be? and therefore inferior to the great Tony Stark. And thus the Worm Ourboros bites his tail.”

Bruce laughed. “And thus speaks the husband of Loki!”

“Nah.” Tony grinned. “Got that one off _The X-Files_ , actually. So, anyway, there I was drooling away in the presence of Merlin the Magician, and it was an elegant combination of disgusting, excruciating and mortifying, with those crimson eyes glaring at me the whole time like I was doggy doo.

"Do not ever, ever piss off a sorcerer. The guy was hard-core. He sent me home with the words, ‘You will feel as my Loki has felt. And, god, did I. Of course I only made it to about the year 1133 before I started to crack completely. If Lok hadn’t stopped it… Don’t ever make the mistake of thinking my guy’s weak. He so isn’t.”

“Is this a warning to me, or…?”

Tony just looked at him. “Why would it be a warning to you, bro?”

“Because I always treat Loki so… shitty. Okay, I see what you did there.”

Tony shook his head. “Weirdly enough, totally not my intent.”

“So if you were cursed for saying bad things, why haven’t you been spitting blood half the year?”

“Ooh, Bruce, ouch! You wound me!” Tony sobered. “You noticed too, huh? Pepper’s on me constantly. And Hela—you ever seen Hela’s thousand-yard stare of death? When your daughter actually _is_ Death and she gives you that look, you’re fully aware you’ve been stared at. All three of the kids, really. You know they’d defend their _Pabbi_ with their tiny, precious, magical lives. And still…”

He picked up the painting again. “It’s so beautiful. I mean, your mom is lovely and it’s great to see her like that, as the beautiful lady who lives in your memory, not the sad one in the pictures. But the painting itself, too, if you’ll forgive me mentioning the fact. I had no clue Lok was working on this. Really. Totally clueless. Without a clue.”

Tony raised his dark-as-sin, probably stone-cold coffee and tossed back the last third-of-a-cup, grimacing horrifically. “Gah! Foul! That was foul!”

“Did you ever pause to consider that, being a confirmed bisexual and legally married to a man, you may have already irrevocably broken The Official Howard Stark Rules of Manliness, and so, being already damned, you could add a splash of cream to your coffee. Or maybe ease into it. Start with skim milk, work your way up to cream?”

“Or that shit powder stuff. What’s that made of, unspecified petroleum products and sugar?”

“Coconut oil, actually. I think. And sugar.”

“Maybe I’ll start with that then. Yum.”

Bruce returned to the kitchen for the coffee pot and carton of half-and-half, refilled both their cups, and added a dollop of cream to both.

“This tastes amazingly better,” Tony said. “I can feel myself beginning a long slide into moral decay, culminating in the wearing of clip-on neckties. Will you still love me then, Bruce?”

“I will still love you, bro, but Loki will toss your sorry ass out into the street. The man has standards to uphold. Will you say something effusively thankful to your husband for me? For the painting?”

“I think Loki might like it better if you said to him, personally, ‘Thank you for the painting, Loki. It’s a beautiful likeness of my mom.’ That might work well. He just wants you to like him a little bit. Or at least not to hate him. He’s like a kid. You know how it is. Being hated gets to him. He says it’s like when the serpent dripped poison in his eyes. He feels it eating into him. Hank has a theory that’s why he’s not healing right. In Asgard, he had the healing factor, just like Thor, so although all the hate made him weaker than his brother, he could still carry the weight. Here, after Baldr, after Doom, things being what they are…” Tony stared into his coffee cup for a long time.

“I’m glad Kurt’s with him today. Kurt’s good for him. Better than I am, probably. I’m not exactly puppies, kittens, sunshine and flowers wrapped up in an adorable ball of blue fuzz, am I?”

“I could mention that Loki married you, not Kurt.”

“Yeah, you could mention it. I could mention that Hank doesn’t even bother to yell at me anymore, not even about the pregnancy. With Wilhelm he asked me if I honestly thought I was too fucking good to bottom for a few months to save my fiancé’s life. I swear it was one of the only two times in my adult years that I have known sexual embarrassment.”

Bruce looked at him.

Tony sighed. “You’re wondering about the other one.”

“Inquiring minds,” Bruce said.

“I got shit-faced drunk at a dive bar on the Lower East Side. Actually, this is a twofer of humiliation. Part one, I tried to pick up this twenty-two year old Goth chick who looked like Loki. The word ‘dad’ may have been included in her refusal. Worst of all, you could see in her eyes she knew exactly who I was, so not even my fucking money was sufficient incentive. I was _that_ repulsive to her.”

“Ouch,” Bruce said.

“Part two, our hero, now so fucking drunk that he couldn’t have spelled his own name, stumbles to the men’s room, where he meets a gentleman with an interest in mutual manual gratification. Our hero retains no recollection of either the other gentlemen’s face or whether his wishes were acquiesced to. He has only the vaguest memory of his trusty chauffeur abandoning him on a tarp in the back of his own town car, the easier, presumably, to both dispose of his corpse and also keep the upholstery tidy should he suffer a Jimi Hendrix, John Bonham-related death in the nighttime. Oh, man though, does he ever remember being paralytically hung over the next morning, and his devastatingly handsome husband descending upon him like the spirit of bloody vengeance, hauling him upright, and _sniffing him_.”

“And of course he knew.” Bruce grimaced in sympathy. “I remember the note. With the stationery. And the penmanship. It looked like a declaration of war from a hostile foreign nation.”

“Which it totally wasn’t. It was just my sweet baby trying to uphold his dignity when his heart was breaking.” Tony leaned forward, setting down his cup just a little too hard, a little too shakily.

“What’s it been, about twenty months now we've been together, more or less? I could have made his life so good. I had fucking good intentions, Bruce. What the hell was wrong with me? I had to shoot myself in the foot again and again and again. And here I was supposed to be comforting you.”

“It’s okay, Tone,” Bruce said quietly, when he really was suddenly, deeply worried, when he really wanted to ask, _God, Tony, what did Hank say? Tony, what did Hank say to you?_

He didn’t though, because Tony started crying, and Tony crying was an unthinkable, unimaginable thing.

After a while, Bruce put his arm around Tony’s shoulders, and Tony leaned into him, hard, just sagging into Bruce’s body, but that was okay, he could support his friend.

At least it felt like something, something he could do.

He wished very hard, to a number of things he no longer believed in, that he’d never thought his terrible thoughts of the previous day, about Loki and his own, selfish, freedom.

Though he knew it was nothing but pointless superstition, he felt as if he’d summoned darkness down onto their world.

* * *

“Awake now, _lieber Freund_?” Kurt asked, stroking Loki’s cheek with the tip of his tail. “Are you better?”

“ _Ja_ , better,” Loki answered sleepily. His eyes did not open, but a small, pleased smile hovered over his lips. “I am very comfortable now, and lovely German words fill my head. Have you been singing to me, _mein treuer Freund_?”

Kurt laughed softly. “I have been singing old, old German songs, and also the works of The Beatles, translated into my native tongue.”

“Tell me again, what is ‘blackbird’ in German?”

“ _’Amsel singen in der Nacht_ ’,” Kurt sang quietly, with a slight, necessary adjustment in the rhythm of the words, smiling down on his friend. “There, that’s your favorite song, Lo.”

“ _Amsel_ is blackbird.”

“It is.”

“That shall be his name. Edwin Amsel Lokison Stark. Does it please you, Kurt?”

“I think it’s lovely, Lo.”

“You are very kind to me, dear Kurt, to stay all day, when I am so perfectly disgusting.”

“You are not disgusting, little brother. I love you.” His lips pressed to Loki’s warm forehead. "You never will be disgusting to me."

“I am disgusting to Tony.”

“Foolish Loki, are you looking for trouble? You are not disgusting to Tony either, you are the _hjarta hjarta hans_. He is only sad, and terribly, terribly worried for you. You see, he borrows trouble too, but I know you are a sensible god of mischief in the end, and will be quiet and still, as Hank has told you, and allow others to help you as you always try so hard to help them. You are not by any means to go to Director Coulson, either, he will come to you instead, and Jorge will bring a few of the children by when you’re a little stronger, because we know you miss them, and they miss you. See, all is well.”

Kurt took Loki’s hand in his own, rubbing it gently. Loki's fingers felt like icicles. “As for me, I’ve spoken with Logan and with Tony, and we all agree.”

“What is that, Kurt?” Loki sounded so tired, and Kurt knew sleep would claim him again soon, but he wanted his friend to hear, to know.

“That the best thing now is for me to stay here in the penthouse and care for you, Lo. ‘Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge.’”

“Those you spoke are words of your Book,” Loki said.

“They are words of my Book,” Kurt agreed.

“Yet they are not words of anger, or…”

Kurt cleared his throat softly.

“I have not read extensively,” Loki continued by way of apology. “Surely I have missed much of good. The words you spoke were words of loyalty and strength. I approve them.”

“Dearest friend,” Kurt said, quietly, yet with laughter in his voice. “I also approve of you, always, and I could not love you more."


	7. Every Time A Bell Rings...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kurt is a loving friend. Phil and Clint get together. Hate isn't really hate if someone else _makes_ you feel it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony is probably thinking of Shakespeare's _Sonnet 116_ , which speaks of love as "an ever-fixed mark,/That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;/It is the star to every wandering bark...."
> 
> Scottish singer-songwriter Gerry Rafferty had a hit in 1979 with the song " _Right Down the Line_ ," which contains the line, "You've been as constant as a northern star/The brightest light that shines."
> 
> Back in the 60's, actor Dick van Dyke starred in _The Dick van Dyke Show_. Fred MacMurray starred in _My Three Sons_. Television decency standards of the time would not allow the depiction of toilets or any bed larger than twin-size, even if the characters were a married couple.
> 
> Loki's ironically-spoken, "Home again, home again, jiggety-jig," comes from the English nursery rhyme " _To Market, To Market_ ":
> 
> _To market, to market to buy a fat pig;_   
>  _Home again, home again, jiggety-jig._   
>  _To market, to market, to buy a fat hog;_   
>  _Home again, home again, jiggety-jog_
> 
> Although the rhyme dates back to the 15th century, it was first published in the “ _Songs for the Nursery _” collection in 1805.__
> 
> __Phil's song is the melancholy and beautiful " _I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry_ " by Hank Williams._ _
> 
> __The children's book _Green Eggs and Ham_ , is a children's book by Dr. Seuss (the pen name of Theodor Seuss Geisel) was first published in 1960. The slightly less well known _If I Ran the Circus_ , by the same author, was published in 1956._ _
> 
> __Dale Chihuly is a renowned glass-sculptor known for his somewhat jellyfish- and coral-like glass creations. If you're ever in Seattle, the Chihuly Garden and Glass Museum, right next to the Space Needle, is definitely worth a visit._ _
> 
> __As Zuzu tells us in _It's a Wonderful Life_ (1946), "Every time a bell rings, an angel gets its wings."_ _

* * *

One thing Tony had finally realized (and it had been a lesson hard won, to his own shame), was that the thing the poems and the songs talked about, namely, off the top of his head, that really, really famous Shakespeare sonnet, number whatever--Loki, naturally, would be able to tell him in a heartbeat, as well as, almost certainly, being able to quote the whole damn thing verbatim--and also that soft-rock megahit of his youth, “ _Right Down the Line_ ,” by the late Mr. Gerry Rafferty.

Love "constant as the North Star," he’d discovered, was an actual thing. A real thing. Who woulda thought?

Not only was that love an actual thing, it happened to be something he, Tony Stark, possessed, in the person of his husband, therefore he might as well throw his suitcase of petty jealousies right out the window, because they were useless. More than that, they made no sense.

The only force that could ever make Loki stop loving him was... well... him, and Tony had now made it his official goal in life to stop every last bit of that ridiculousness.

Nuh-unh. Never again, Tony. Never again.

Furthermore, Kurt (besides being pretty much the best person Tony could ever remember having known) happened to be equally rock-solid with Logan, no question about it. If he found Kurt cuddled up in bed with Loki, wrapped around him like a fuzzy, soft, life-sized plushie, the two of them together cute as puppies, it was because Loki badly needed that tenderness, that touching. Unfaithfulness didn't enter into it, and their closeness shouldn’t ever be viewed as any kind of betrayal. Cuddles with Kurt were an antidote to the strong and terrible poison of hate Loki had been steeping in for so many months and years.

It was (so to speak) like the children of the world clapping to save Tinkerbell, flinging their belief and care out into the universe, and if other people didn’t understand, so what? To hell with them. Tony understood.

Fuck, close association with Loki was making him get all poetic. Okay, partially poetic. What was next, spontaneous lute-playing?

Tony touched Kurt’s shoulder gently. “Hey, you.”

A sliver of yellow eye peered out at him through a thicket of Loki’s rapidly-growing hair. Kurt moved the stray strand gently away from his face, coming fully awake in an instant, the way he always did. He extricated himself oh-so-carefully from Loki’s embrace, looking perfectly relaxed, his usual sweet, warm self. They understood each other, knew there was no need for guilt or excuses, only for making Loki happy and well again.

“There were dreams. Not-so-bad ones, and easily comforted.” Kurt gave an epic stretch, rising on the balls of his feet, spine arched and hands over his head. “Ach, I hadn’t meant to fall asleep,” he whispered. Though Kurt’s ordinary speaking voice was quite pleasant, his whispers always sounded almost comically sinister, a byproduct of the fangs, Tony suspected. “Please forgive me.”

“Nothing to forgive. It’s really great of you to help Loki—and me—out like this. Putting your own life on hold and everything.” Tony felt like he was blushing, and Tony Stark, most emphatically, did not blush. “You’re the best, Kurt. Really. Logan too, though it sounds damn awkward when I say the words.”

“I always have the same trouble,” Kurt answered, with one of his kind smiles. Even though it might not be the truth—Tony had never heard Kurt sound awkward over anything, he was always graciousness itself—it was a generous thing to say.

He and Tony removed themselves to the bathroom to talk, Tony sitting on the closed toilet lid, Kurt perching on the edge of the vanity. Kurt, when he wasn’t dangling upside down from anything that would hold his weight, tended to be a percher.

Tony liked to think he was in decent shape, especially for a guy his age, but he wondered sometimes what it would be like to be like Kurt, to feel so strong and free in his own body, every muscle ready to do exactly what he wanted, when he wanted. To have such balance, emotional and physical.

“I meant to mention earlier, Kurt,” Tony said. “The foot looks like it’s doing great.”

“Oh, _ja_ , it’s nearly good as the real thing these days, thanks to the extremely clever men who created it.” Kurt grinned, balancing with perfect ease as he stretched the leg in question out in front of him, closing his foot, talon-like, into a perfect circle. “Not quite as strong, yet, as the original, though I continue to work on it. I have the greatest hopes, Tony. I am very grateful.”

Kurt meant it as a compliment, of course—Tony had been one of those clever men, along with Hank McCoy, who Tony knew was equally fond of the young German.

Giving Kurt a partial new foot was the least he could do, considering that Kurt lost a large chunk of the original saving his life, along with the lives of Loki and the kids, by teleporting blind out of the isolated cell that might—realistically, _would_ \--otherwise have been their final resting place. Tony guessed what touched him most about Kurt’s act of selfless courage was that he knew the mutant would have been just as brave, just as selfless, if it had been only Tony to be saved, instead of Tony and Loki and the kids. He was that kind of guy.

He also knew, beyond a doubt (and in a totally non-religious sense, because that was all he had to rely on) Kurt had been Loki’s, and therefore his own, salvation.

“Have I mentioned, Kurt, how important you are to us?” Tony found himself blurting out. He still felt raw, stripped nearly skinless, from his time with Bruce. His voice quavered ever so slightly as he said the words.

“ _Lieber Freund_ , what is it?” Kurt smiled his bright, merry, fangy smile, everything about him speaking of kindness and sympathy. “Tony, you must know this about our good friend Hank McCoy: like his namesake of Star Trek fame, his pronouncements are always dire. Yes, Loki is in a fragile state just now, but we will not lose him. He will be well and strong again, because we will love and care for him, always. You are very tired, Tony, I think, and you two have been through so much that divided you in these past weeks, but your husband will be well. Did you see how peacefully he slept? He will heal. He was even able to eat a little this afternoon, and enjoy it.”

That was Kurt, ever the optimist. He just didn’t have Tony’s capacity for working himself up into full, blind terror at a moment’s notice.

“Bruce loved the painting of his mom. Did you know about it?”

Kurt’s tail snapped back and forth a couple times, which Tony took as a yes. Also a, “Bruce is not at the top of my next Christmas list.”

He’d never heard Kurt say a negative word about anyone, but he’d noticed the tail was often considerably more sassy—judgmental, even.

“Well, okay, yeah,” Tony said. He wanted, somehow, to apologize to Kurt on Bruce’s behalf, then realized he couldn’t, not in good conscience, not anymore.

He’d just started to stand up, but sat down again, hard. Bruce was like his brother, he loved Bruce, and cutting him loose would break his heart. But Loki was his husband. His loyal, loving, impossibly wonderful husband. Tony owed him everything, not just half-measures and divided loyalties.

Tony rubbed both hands roughly over his face. Kurt was right, he was tired.

So, so damn tired.

Tony realized suddenly that he was walking, half-asleep on his feet, Kurt shepherding him back toward the bedroom. He practically fell into bed, cuddling up immediately to his sleeping husband, Kurt unfolding the covers up over them. “Good night, dear friends and brothers,” he said, in his quiet, gentle voice, into the haze of Tony’s fading consciousness, “Sweetest dreams. I love you both.”

* * *

He should probably cut down on coffee, Clint considered. Make it his New Year’s resolution or something. If he kept on like this it might throw off his aim, and then…

Who was he kidding? It wasn’t going to throw off his aim. Losing an eye wouldn’t throw off his aim. And he wasn’t going to cut down on coffee, either, not with Rosenblum’s, the best damn coffee (and bagels) in Manhattan in residence right there on the ground floor, feeding his habit.

Clint paused a moment outside the deli’s squeaky-clean glass door, briefly closing his eyes, just letting the noises of the city sink in. Taxi horns. Garbage trucks. Voices raised in argument.

All music to his ears. Ears that could actually hear again without those small, buzzing, annoying pieces of shit poked inside them, making his head feel like it was stuffed full of cotton and steel filings.

Clint loved being settled in this huge, crazy city even more than he’d hated the shiftless, dishonest life he’d had to live when he was young, moving with the circus and his so-called family from dingy town to different, dingy town.

His experiences as an agent and assassin weren’t much better: foreign city after foreign city, never knowing more than a few words of the language, never staying long enough to soak up the customs or enjoy the food, never anybody to have his back except Natasha.

Of course he had to play too cool for school and not let on, but he loved having a team, loved the people on his team, his family, the closest thing to a for-real family he’d ever known, because even with his brother-by-blood, it had always been, _What can I get out of this situation?_ and, _Always look out for number one._

At (mumble, mumble) years of age, he’d finally had his first Christmas, the first real one he could remember anyway, with the delicious home-cooked food, the candles, the fire in the fireplace, the carols, excited children opening toys (that would be Tony, ha-ha, just joking), even gifts not chosen at random from some department store. There’d been warmth, friendship, caring and (dare he say it?) even love.

After, when the celebration had sleepily broken up and everyone had drifted off to bed, Clint hadn’t been able to sleep.

Phil was yawning his head off as he OCD’d away his worn clothes and pulled on his p.j.’s. Phil was not a guy to just pull on a pair of boxers or sweats and call it a day. His pajamas were seasonal, came in matched sets, and looked like the kind of sleepwear dads dressed in on 60’s sitcoms—Clint could totally picture Dick van Dyke or Fred MacMurray wearing the exact same pairs, in a bathroom that had no toilet, or a master bedroom with twin beds, in a world where everything came in muted shades of gray.

Phil ironed his pajamas, even the flannel ones. He also ironed his jeans, most of his sweaters, and his t-shirts. It went without saying, really, that his dress-shirts were miracles of crispness. Clint suspected he ironed his socks and underwear, too, though he’d never caught him in the act.

Ironing, for Phil, was a recreational activity. He’d put on one of his golden oldies records (on vinyl, of course, at his place Phil had an entire wall of vinyl records, divided by genre, then alphabetized), sing along, and make the steam whoosh.

Phil had, not surprisingly, a very pleasant singing voice. So did Clint, actually. Phil also played the piano. He’d taken lessons sometime in his distant boyhood, stuck with it, and played well. He wasn’t a crazed virtuoso, like Loki, but made a far-more-than-adequate accompanist.

Every year, in December, Phil bought two wall calendars, one of Great Danes, one of historic New York.

In his personal life, away from S.H.I.E.L.D., Phil drove a Volvo, which he winterized and summerized every year. He also changed the oil every three months. The car looked brand new, though slightly retro—the truth was, it was old enough to both drink and serve in the military. Its name was Sonja. Phil liked to name things.

Before Clint, in all his longer-than-expected life, Phil had had two lovers, Frederick and James, and loved them with everything he had to give.

He’d outlived them both. James, a photojournalist, had been shot down in a helicopter over Viet Nam. Frederick, an architect, had an out-of-the-blue heart attack snorkeling on vacation in Maui, nearly breaking Phil’s heart at the same time.

There was also his little man-crush on Captain America. Clint knew better than to tease.

Clint had been with lots of lovers (who weren’t really lovers, as such, not in the actual _loving_ sense of the word), in lots of different places. None of them meant nothing to him, but none exactly meant anything, either. There were people he loved—Natasha, for one—but he’d made rules for himself against fucking them.

And then there was Phil.

Clint and Phil worked together for years, their relationship mostly strictly professional, except that they’d usually meet at the end of a mission, if there wasn’t too much debriefing to be done, for a glass of bourbon or a brewsky, Clint drinking from the bottle, Phil from a glass he’d previously wiped with a paper napkin before he poured his beer.

After New Mexico, and Thor, they met in a dusty, seedy bar, like a saloon in an old western, which looked as if it had been dropped haphazardly at a random spot in the desert. The beer was icy-cold, though, and an old Wurlitzer jukebox with red and green lights played Hank Williams and Patsy Cline at just the right volume, easy to hear, but also easy to talk over, if you were so inclined.

Sometimes Clint and Phil talked as they drank. Not so much, that night.

Clint liked the place. It was anonymous, dimly lighted and smelled vaguely deserty, whatever that meant. A dry scent, a little bit like the herbs he might have used if he was making spaghetti sauce.

For the first time, they sat and drank bottle after bottle. It seemed necessary somehow, to restore order to their world. Now and then Clint’s bare arm brushed Phil's well-pressed sleeve and Phil would almost grin, just a flickering at the corners of his lips. Once Phil’s hand rested lightly, for several seconds, on Clint’s thigh.

It wasn’t until Phil began singing softly along with the jukebox, though, that the archer understood what was happening.

Phil sang:

_The silence of a falling star_  
_Lights up a purple sky._  
_And as I wonder where you are_  
_I'm so lonesome I could cry…_

After a last beer they left the saloon, with its hopeful neon lights, wandering into the darker terrain behind the building and down a slight slope. Here, away from electricity, the huge, round moon gave everything sharp edges, and glittered on the surface of a narrow stream that slid its slow way between sandstone banks.

Clint and Phil sat in the sparse, crunchy grass by the water-side. Phil removed his dress shoes, folded his socks together, neatly rolled up his pants.

Clint kicked off his boots, dropped his crumpled socks into one of them, wriggled out of his jeans, just leaving his boxers and vest.

The temperature hadn’t yet dropped into the night’s desert chill, and after the day’s heat, even the lukewarm water felt good on their skin as they dangled their feet into the stream.

Feet still in the water, Clint flopped back on the bank, gazing up at the night sky. It seemed enormous, the biggest sky he’d seen in his life.

“Hey, there went a falling star,” he said. “The sky really is purple, too.” He turned his eyes to Phil’s, which looked very dark in the semi-darkness. “And I’m right here.” His own voice sounded hoarse, urgent. “Right here, Phil.”

“Right here,” Phil echoed softly. He bent down and pressed his lips to Clint’s lips, a perfectly Phil kiss, completely chaste, completely passionate.

That was all it took, really. Just like that, they were together.

Until Loki and his scepter.

Until Phil “died.”

Loki read them all as easily as a Professor of English could read Dr. Seuss— _Green Eggs and Ham_ , maybe, or _If I Ran the Circus_. To him their human minds probably did seem brightly-colored and whimsical, like picture books for children.

The scene in Stuttgart, Clint later found out, had been a carefully-staged lie. Loki had allowed himself to be caught, allowed his “plot” to be “discovered,” using even Natasha’s cleverness against her, goaded Tony, goaded Thor, allowed Hulk to thrash him like an angry child with a ragdoll, until he lay groaning in a hole in Tony’s floor.

He could have teleported away at any time.

Loki didn’t want to.

He’d lain groaning, but laughing inside, the too-large, oppressive alien presence finally absent from his own brilliant, quicksilver, equally alien mind, Loki’s relief too great to be encompassed or contained.

Loki had allowed himself to be chained, muzzled, and locked away.

Clint went to see him in the Hulk Tank. With him, Loki didn’t bother to keep up his façade of malevolence. He looked exhausted, maybe glad that it was finally over, but also sad.

_Home again, home again, jiggety-jig_ , he said in Clint’s mind, with a little smile, both mental and physical, Clint suspected, though with the ugly muzzle in place he couldn’t actually see.

_I could_ … Clint began.

_No_ , Loki told him quietly. _In all honesty, where would I go? Better I should take the punishment I_ _deserve._

_But you don’t_ … Clint tried again.

I _do, my friend, I do, for the lives lost… The destruction… Why could I not have done better?_ _Why?_

Loki slid down against the back wall. His impressive armor melted away to a simple green tunic, leggings, and boots. He looked so young, so confused and heartbroken Clint’s heart broke in turn.

_I feel great sorrow for your grief_ , Loki told him. _Your lot squabbled endlessly . You required unity and focus. I could think of no other ready way to effect a change. Your Phillip will, however, return within the month. Is Tahiti a place within your world? A good place?_

Clint showed him pictures, the images in his own mind.

_Wondrous, truly! How I wish myself in your Tahiti, though the sun and the heat oft-times likes me not. Still, the Allfather will know how to take all at face value, ignoring common sense, fact and that he should well be aware of in my skills and my wit. He will know how to judge me—he has been doing so for centuries._

_I am never clever enough, never strong enough, to do so well as I should,_ Loki added. _Why is that, Clint? You should hate me!_

And, just like that, he did. Hated Loki. _Hated_ him!

Though, when he searched his memory, Clint couldn’t remember the reason.

Even now the alien god confused the hell out of him. For example, why had he put up with their collective shit? If he wanted, he could fry out their brains, or meld their bodies into the meat version of the Chihuly-style sculpture that now adorned the penthouse terrace, glass melted down from Tony’s many, many liquor bottles.

Clint knew that was something his teammates didn’t get, especially Bruce—just how truly powerful Loki was. That if Loki had only wished it, The Hulk would now be an industrial-sized ring-mold of lime Jell-O, attractively studded with mini-marshmallows, and Loki himself would be sitting on a stylish Art Deco throne in some major city, commanding the peoples of the world to read more books, dress better and say “please” and “thank you” more frequently.

The others didn’t understand that for the overall plan to succeed, saving thousands, if not millions, of lives, people had to die. Mostly Loki had gone after S.H.I.E.L.D., tough, trained operatives and soldiers, not civilians. The civilian casualties happened because of the Chitauri, and even those were surprisingly light. Some Chitauri had to come through for the invasion to seem like an invasion. Some did. The Avengers handled them. End of story.

Aliens defeated. Shawarma for all!

Except for Loki, alone in his cell, muzzled and chained by his own brother (“He’s adopted,” Thor had said, as if that changed anything), the same words running over and over in his head, I am never clever enough, never strong enough, to do so well as I should…

And then, in complete despair, For mercy’s sake, if I am meant for the axe… just SWING it!

Even hating Loki as he had then, Clint felt sorry, too. He knew it wasn’t right, it wasn’t fair.

The truth was, he’d never been able to hate Loki completely, even when Loki compelled him to do so. Clint had seen too much of who Loki was at heart for that command to stick.

He still heard Loki (and sometimes Tony and the kids, too, to a far lesser extent, and that fuzzy goofball Kurt Wagner, that scary bastard Logan, and even Phil’s goddamn adorable dog, these days—anyone, actually, Loki listened to).

It wasn't intrusive, really. In a weird way, it was comforting. It kept the loneliness at bay.

Loki’s brain was like a library, shelves upon shelves of self-contained worlds, of boundless information. Even as a kid, Clint had liked to read, though he’d usually been discouraged from doing so.

Sometimes, when he couldn’t sleep, when the memories of Budapest, or the many places and events too much like Budapest to dwell on, grew huge and heavy in the dark. When even lying beside brave Phil, who he loved, Clint felt frightened and alone, he’d slip sideways into that huge, expansive mind and just… browse.

Always, Clint would feel a light, warm, welcoming touch, and then he’d be left to do as he pleased, the presence always quietly nearby, if needed.

Just now he took a more direct route. _Hey, you, I’m heading in to Rosenblum’s--want anything?_

Loki was sleepy, and felt like complete shit. _No!_ he grumped.

_Gotta eat, honeybear._

Surprisingly, Loki laughed. _Kurt will have a sesame seed bagel with cream cheese and turkey. Tony wants an onion bagel with cream cheese and lox—ugh, he shall not kiss me after!_

_You could steal the lox of his bagel when he’s not looking,_ Clint suggested.

Apparently, though, even lox wasn't appealing on that particular day.

_I’m waiting for your order, sir,_ Clint teased _. Good thing I’m a nice guy, or I’d tell your minions to haul their asses downstairs and get their own damn bagels._

There was a pause, apparently Loki running the comment through his humor detectors.

_Chicken soup would not be entirely terrible_ , Loki said at last.

_That’s my good little deity!_

_Very amusing._

Okay, _there_ was Loki's professor-voice.

Another pause followed.

_Clint, when you come up, would you deign to watch a film with us?_

Clint grinned. _Yeah, Loki, I think I could probably deign_.

_Very good, then._ Beneath Loki’s general feeling-horribleness, Clint could sense him smiling too.  _We shall expect you soon._

A bell jingled over the door as Clint entered the deli.

_How about that,_ he thought, _An angel just got its wings._


	8. Somewhere Over the Rainbow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki is still not at his best, but Tony's improving by leaps and bounds. Loki's fears about Baby Edwin are partially eased by Sherlock, of all people. Hela convenes a meeting of the Sorority of Deaths (Omega Omega Omega?) and moves on to the next stage of her plans, which partially involve the giving back of things that didn't belong to Odin in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _deliciae meae puellae_ =my darling girl (Latin)
> 
> As a native of the Seattle area (once voted "Dreariest City in the U.S."), I amuse myself by imagining Queen Hela's realm as something like an eternal Seattle February, complete with lots of fog and dripping evergreens. Of course that means the Queen  
> herself spends a lot of time drinking warm beverages, reading and watching movies, right?
> 
> _Spellvirki_ =Mischief (Icelandic).  
>  I don't know if this Icelandic compound word is made up of true cognates or not, but on Loki's behalf, I love the thought of "spellworkings" and "mischief" being the same thing.
> 
> _Kuningas_ =King (Finnish)
> 
> Hela is thinking of the 1977 Greek film _Iphigenia_ directed by Michael Cacoyannis, based on the myth of Iphigenia, the daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra. The goddess Artemis demands that the young girl be sacrificed as a condition for the 1000 ships of the Greeks to be able to set sail for Troy. Dad gives in, Mom is not pleased.

* * *

“Are you bored because you’re feeling better?” Tony asked. “Or are you bored because you just feel better enough to feel how shitty you actually feel, but nobody can do anything about it?”

“That statement sounded nonsensical in the extreme,” Loki answered in irritation, wriggling a little on his back on the bed. The Egyptian cotton sheets, normally so silken, felt like gravel against his bare, hot, tender skin. He ought to rise and find the softest garments he owned, perhaps the remarkable pyjamas of bamboo-fabric Tony had kindly gifted him with at _Jul_. Anything to ease the abrasion he had not felt when lying against Kurt's down-soft fur.

He could not, Loki knew, expect Kurt to keep ever near him, only to provide a comfortable sleeping surface for his oversensitive self, though he must admit he missed his friend for that, and many, many other reasons. It was so extremely kind, already, for Kurt to consent to stay at the tower and care for him at all, to be apart from Logan, who he loved so dearly, through the weekdays, seeing him only at weekends. He owed his friend times of solitude, to rest or exercise, to attend the masses of his religion or to enjoy his own pursuits. Loki felt immense gratitude--along with a foolish tearfulness, in these days--that after so many years, he had discovered, by merest coincidence, such a loving friend.

And such a rare love, as well, for his husband, the heart of his heart. Tony fetched the pajamas, though Loki had not sent to him so much as a word or desire, helping him with great tenderness to slip into the garments. It remained wondrous to him that the Midgardians had learnt to spin and weave such a cloth from a rattling, woody grass. He felt very grateful, too, that he had scarcely needed to move, for though his skin was almost immediately soothed, his spine, hip-bones, ribs all felt as if they were soon about to crack in divers places and their connective tissues shred to ribbons. He wriggled again, arching his sore back to ease it.

Loki knew the moment he did so, his pyjama top pulling up toward his ribs, that he had made a grievous error.

“Oh, my nonexistent god, your little baby bump!” Tony crowed. “It’s so cute! Oh, can I touch it?”

“You _can_ , but should you do so, I should have no choice but to smite you for the offense,” Loki snapped, and nearly meant it, though he meant, even more, to be kind to Tony, as Tony became daily more kind to him. “And so, you _may_ not.”

“Ah, ah! No magic!” Tony teased. "Or correction of my grammar." He clearly found the entire situation, and Loki’s cranky mood--he had learned the word from Tony himself, though it seemed to bear no actual connection to mechanical cranks of any sort--hilarious.

“I need no magic to smite you, mortal.” Loki’s hand shot out to catch hold of his husband the moment he strayed within reach, attempting some degree of the playfulness he knew Tony missed, pulling him down quite hard beside him on the bed. Unfortunately, the impact of his husband's body made the mattress bounce dramatically.

The bouncing, in turn, sent nausea and dizziness whirling instantly through Loki’s stomach and head.

“Bin?” Tony asked with sympathy, no longer joking.

“No,” Loki said through clenched teeth, breathing carefully, cold sweat sheathing his body. He squeezed shut his eyes, until slowly, slowly, the horrid, room-spinning ebbed. “Ah...” He cleared his throat, which burned.

“Better, babe?” Tony propped himself up on one elbow. His hand rested warmly on Loki’s clammy forehead.

“Umn.” Loki dared not say more.

“I totally forgot about those Go-Go Gadget arms of yours. No kidding you don’t need magic to smite me.”

Loki opened one eye a mere crack. “I know not…”

“Inspector Gadget. He’s a cartoon character. With a bunch of gadgets… uh… mechanical devices to help him solve crimes.”

Loki glanced at his own pale wrist. Tony’s allusions were so very odd at times.

“He has telescoping arms, okay?”

“Telescope…?”

Tony laughed. “Not what you look at the stars through, sweetheart. They expand. Get long. Thanks for totally stepping on my joke, by the way.”

Loki began to tense, then realized Tony wasn’t actually angry in the least. His face showed only kindness and concern.

“Come here, you,” Tony said, moving closer to Loki instead of away. His rough, warm hand moved to rub Loki’s abdomen in slow circles under his shirt. “How’s the tummy? Better? I really am sorry you feel so crappy, my love.” He moved closer still, then turned Loki toward him and rubbed his back a little more firmly, kneading into the muscles and between the bones. The touch of his husband’s strong hands felt wonderful, as if by his strength Tony pushed the pain to some deep, interior space where it could no longer trouble every inch of his body.

Tony crooned softly as he worked, “My baby, oh, my baby,” which only added to Loki’s feeling of warmth and security, knowing Tony sang to both of them. To him, and to small Edwin.

Edwin remained too young to hear or absorb much yet, certainly too young yet to respond the least bit, but Loki made sure to send him, the best he could, messages always of love and acceptance, to be certain he knew the darker past lay behind them.

Sometimes he awoke sweating and shaking from dreams that Edwin, in all his small self, hated and resented him still.

Loki could not bear the thought that a child of his should hate him. After the last dream he’d gone so far as to ring Sherlock in London, just to soothe himself.

“What do you want?” Sherlock had demanded.

“I wondered what you were doing,” Loki said. “Is it interesting?”

Sherlock snorted out a long breath through his nose. “Let me put you on hands-free. I’m dissecting eyeballs.” He described his actions as he worked: the steps he took, what he hoped to discover. It was, actually, quite interesting, and although Sherlock enjoyed to speak of himself, always, Loki delighted also in his son’s words, in his cleverness, and attention to his work.

Sherlock was Sherlock, and Loki loved him for himself. He felt no need for his son to be other than he was.

The conversation proved to Loki another thing—even Sherlock did not hate him, despite his failures as a parent. Rather, though much sharing was not in his son’s nature, Sherlock meant to share his life with Loki as best he was able.

After Sherlock finished his dissection they spoke for a time of violin music, his son recommending odd pieces he thought Loki might enjoy.

Sherlock ended the conversation with, “It’s not unpleasant to speak with you. At times I find myself thinking of you almost with a peculiar fondness.”

“I love you also, my dear son,” Loki answered, and both knew they meant the same thing.

By the time he rang off, Loki felt far happier. He no longer believed Edwin would hate, hurt or deceive him, as he had done in his first life, as the Ghost in the Wall. He would love his little son, and Edwin would love him.

He need not make trouble where none existed.

Tony had fallen asleep beside him. Loki wrapped his long limbs around his husband, holding him fast, as if for dearest life, and slept as well.

He dreamed of walking hand-in-hand with Sleipnir, along the paths of Central Park, the sky blue overhead, with white clouds like sailing ships, and a thousand bright kites dancing in the air above their heads.

* * *

Hela’s Sisters met her in the stable, where she sat with her brother Sleipnir—most likely the only male ever to have witnessed such an assembly of her kind. The Deaths didn’t mind their accommodations. Having, literally, seen it all, they were an extremely pragmatic group.

Some stood, most drew up hay-bales and made themselves comfortable. The dust and chaff would soon enough fly away from their night-black clothing.

Hela provided the wine. They drank together in perfect companionship.

She was the youngest of their number, but already they had grown to respect her. Hela had spent enough time shadowing Auntie Pepper at work that she knew how to run a meeting and, as she’d once told her dad, Blessed Death was the most honored of all the Deaths. Despite her youth, she already performed her job well, and found it oddly rewarding.

“And so your plan continues apace, _deliciae meae puellae_?” asked the oldest of them all. She appeared in the form of a tall, stern older woman, a patrician Roman lady as depicted in a Victorian painting. Hela would very much have liked to sketch her jewelry and recreate its motifs, perhaps with variations, for one of her collections. Like Hela’s, her skin was white as paper (though the frozen blue light of the object Hela had brought with her to the stable cast a summer-sky glow over them all). Her hair, black and wavy, hung below her waist.

“ _Honorari Avia_ ,” Hela said, declining her head respectfully. Queen Hela had advised her to address this Death so, as “Honored Grandmother,” though her proper title was, truly, “The Violent Death of Gods.”

Blessed Death may have been the most honored, but of all the Deaths and other beings of power, in all the universes and their mirrors, there was none more powerful than she.

Hela thought suddenly of what her Uncle Logan had been known to say now and then, “I’m the best at what I do, but what I do ain’t very nice.”

All the other Deaths, Hela included, had rules governing their takings: who, where, when, why—save this Death, who might do as she liked. The others were basically window dressing for her purpose. They certainly looked impressive in their dark rainment, with their brilliant, watchful eyes. Like Hela herself, they could not harm her grandfather in any real way.

Hela had once thought of breaking the old monster down on her own. She'd studied his ways, and believed she knew how. Queen Hela advised her against the plan.

"Think of why no one takes a James Bond villain seriously," the Queen of the Underworld advised. "It is possible to overplan."

Like Auntie Pepper, Queen Hela was an excellent mentor. In this case, she certainly had a point.

Hela had watched a number of James Bond films with her dad, and also the wildly-inappropriate-for-her-supposed-age Austin Powers movies. She hated, above all things, perhaps, except for wanton cruelty, to appear foolish in anyone's eyes. She would be no Dr. Evil. She would not be a source of laughter unless she wished to be one.

And so, she altered her plans to make them surgical and swift. For that, the one Sister Hela truly needed on her side was The Violent Death of Gods.

“Wither go we?” asked the Eldest One, sounding genuinely interested. It was a thing about the Deaths, Hela had noticed. One might expect them to have become blasé over time, perhaps even hardened or embittered, but they were, on the whole, cheerful company. She liked them, as she liked the women, once so angry and frightened, who co-owned with her _Spellvirki_ , Hela's Midgardian company.

Hela loved to watch them, ever-blooming, as Natasha taught them the secrets of self-defense, Pepper the ways of business, and dear Mr. Pierre of Brooklyn taught them his intricate couture sewing techniques. Already several awards hung upon the break room wall: for Diversity and Design, Public Service and Most Popular New Business. Hela felt pride in them all for, as her _Pabbi_ might say, divers reasons.

In that moment Hela wanted nothing but to live again in the tower, safe with her _Pabbi_ and dad, even if they were still quarreling, with her much-loved brothers, with her uncles and aunts, honorary and otherwise. She wanted to run in Central Park, practice her fencing, fly over her gymnastics equipment and on the trapeze dad didn’t know Uncle Kurt had rigged, because somehow dad thought it all right to fly about in his mad metal suit a mile or more in the air, but not for her to fly upon a perfectly safe trapeze, despite her being a goddess of nearly full blood, and able to levitate besides, whilst he remained distressingly mortal.

She wanted to play music with _Pabbi,_ trade quips with her dad, sing with the Girls’ Choir, paint and draw and craft lovely things with own hands, run her business with what _Pabbi_ always called her “Women of Battery,” battered no more, abused and downtrodden no more, but growing strong, her partners and her friends.

She wanted to walk down the rainbow hand-in-hand with sweet Sleipnir, and deliver him to _Pabbi's_ loving, waiting arms.

She wanted to tap her heels three times and be home for good.

But even more than that she wanted to end the Allfather’s mad reign. For vengeance, yes, only a liar would claim otherwise, and Hela was, on the whole a truthful girl—but also because, though Asgard was not her home, it was her _Realm_ , and she owed her long-enthralled people their freedom. As far as she was concerned, it was past time for The Golden Realm to move into the twenty-first century, to become a constitutional monarchy with the _AlÞingi_ as a true representative parliament.

No more Allfathers or Allmothers with their all-knowing spies, forever spreading fear. No more magical opiates for the masses controlling thought (Asgard had been great once, now it rested on its laurels--when was the last time anyone in Asgard, barring her _Pabbi_ , thought or made anything new?). No more ignorant, foolish bigotry against the _Jötnar_ , or any other race. No idiotic wars for no better reason than for the desire of the men of the _Ӕs_ (along with that brainwashed idiot, Lady Sif, who, knowing Hela to be the daughter of Loki, had been unfailingly rude) to bare their muscles and rattle their swords.

Hela gently ran her fingertips over the surface of the object that sat beside her on the straw. Not a large object, taken for itself, but large compared to Hela's slender young form. Her skin thrilled to its cold, and a cerulean shine moved over her hand that had nothing to with object’s own chill blue light.

“The Casket of Ancient Winters, Honored Sisters,” Hela explained, “Absent too long from its home. Wise Grandmother,” she said, to The Violent Death of Gods, “I thought that we would stop by the Watchman on the bridge and then move on. My uncle, Býleistr _Kuningas_ awaits us in Jötunnheimr.”

“Perhaps I might offer my company,” put in The Death of Kings, dressed in her Cavalier best, with her broad, feathered hat in her gloved hand. “It may well be that after so long without the Casket, all the _Jötnar_ have fallen under your purlieu, sweet Blessed Death, but they are a strong and determined people, with little trust for your blood-sire's kind. Take me, if only to be safe, Youngest Sister.”

“I thank you, Respected Sister,” Hela replied, “Though I would not see my uncle harmed. He has suffered much at _Ӕsir_ hands.”

“I never harm without provocation, sweetness!” The Death of Kings answered cheerfully.

"I accept then, Dear Sister, with gratitude."

Tenderly, Hela slipped the Casket of Ancient Winters into her most secure pocket universe, then kissed her brother and her other Sisters farewell.

"Call when we are needed!" they sang after her, standing in a group before the stable as she departed. "Dear One, we are yours to command!"

"I will!" she called back. "I will, Sisters! I will."

A gust of wind pulled long strands of her black hair across her face, and Hela thought of another film she'd seen, the great Greek actress Irene Pappas as Queen Clytemnestra, standing on a cliff overlooking the sea, just as Hela stood on the Bifrost, overlooking the abyss where her dear _Pabbi_ had fallen so terribly far, so terribly hard, events set in motion that could never be turned back again.

Standing on the edge of the abyss with love and hate, redemption and revenge, hard at war in her young and ancient heart.

Hela placed each of her lace-gloved hands in the hand of an Elder Death and, never once looking back, set out along the Rainbow Bridge


	9. Two Princes, Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Loki under the weather and Tony heading out of town on an unavoidable business trip, Thor has volunteered to get his nephews off to school. Along the way, he remembers when Loki and Hela first revealed their plans to remove Odin from the throne of Asgard. He also recalls the birth of Narfi and Vali, Loki's subsequent escape and his capture and punishment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my goodness, the feels in this one! Thor definitely needs a hug. And Volstagg, too, who  
> despite my... issues with the Warriors 3, suddenly decided to surprise me. Mysterious are the ways of gods and muses!

* * *

“My worthy-of-sagas nephews!” Thor called out as he carefully pressed the keys of unlocking (far, far too small for his large fingers) and the penthouse door swung open before him. The boys burst forth from their rooms much like wild beasts in dressing-gowns, as Thor fully expected, though perhaps beasts of infinite cheerfulness, and he caught them up in his powerful arms, swinging them round, pressing his nose into their sweet-smelling hair, breathing in the boys’ own sweetness along with the clean fragrance of soap.

Thor loved these younglings with a completeness that nearly surprised him, not merely because they were Loki’s (and to have Loki returned to him as brother, Shield-Brother, truest friend and confidante was a wonder in itself), but because they were small beings of such brightness and joy, who loved him in return as fully as he loved them.

The boys, his nephews, filled Thor with delight, and it had been so very long—centuries it sometimes seemed--since delight truly had been known to him.

The thought that he would soon enough experience the joy of his own children, and that he would know the love for them he knew now for his brother’s younglings, gave to him a sense of utter wonder.

Thor did not believe that he could love the children of his blood more--in truth, that scarcely seemed possible--but that he would love them as much as these beloved boys and their sister must truly be what Loki’s most-worthy friend Kurt Wagner would term a miracle.

That his younglings, and Loki’s, would grow up happy together, cared for by loving parents and their own resourceful, independent selves, and not by gold-bought or enthralled servants, seemed another miracle. That they would not be forced to fight one another, either physically or for regard most often withheld, or at best doled out with a miser’s hand, seemed yet a third. A fourth, that his girl-child could be raised as equal to her brother, with all her brother's amusements and education, no discouragement to her hopes and dreams.

Never would his dear daughter be sent, as her grandmother had been, to a foreign Realm where she knew no one, least of all the alien king she was required, without a thought to her own wishes, to wed. Never would she be a political pawn only, roughly moved from square to square to suit his, or his father’s, fancy.

She would be, in his dear Lady Jane’s words, “Her own person.”

Oft-times Thor found it difficult to recall that he, too, was his own person now, as well. He defended Earth because he chose to do so, because it was his home, and its worthy people deserving of his strength and skill. He would soon wed Lady Jane, as Loki had wed his Avengers Shield-brother Tony, out of the greatness of the love in his heart. He sired children as a proof of that love, and to build a much-treasured family, not to populate a throne.

His ordinary work might perhaps not change the world, but it brought Thor happiness, and an easiness in his frequently-troubled mind, such as he had never known. He took pleasure, also, in the joy he brought to others. A small, transitory, insignificant joy, some might say, but still joy.

He felt no desire for a throne, to be a prince or even a king. He would protect his new world, naturally, and its people. He would protect his loved ones and friends, but he far preferred to be Chef Thor Friggason (someday soon, he hoped, as he worked with more diligence now at his education than he had worked at any task before) than Prince Thor of Asgard.

He could easily go many years, he thought, before setting foot again in the Eternal Realm. Perhaps sooner than that, Thor though wryly, But only for the gladsome occasion of my sire’s funeral .

When they were strong and grown, perhaps, his children might also visit Asgard, land of his blood, but not before.

Never would they go whilst his father yet sat upon the throne. Never.

Thor shivered a little when he thought of Loki and Hela, and their plans. Some weeks past, as soon as they’d known his niece and nephew must attend the Allfather in the Golden City, Loki had summoned him, casting a circle of silence around they three.

“He is your father, Thor,” his brother said to him. “Say us nay and at your word, all plans end here. Give your blessing…” Loki lifted one thin shoulder, his face intent but kind.

Thor had shivered then, too. “What is your meaning, dear ones? Imprisonment again, or…?”

Loki’s gaze never wavered. “Oh, ‘or,’ I should think, brother, wouldn’t you?” For only an instant, Loki’s voice, his appearance, resembled his old self, at least the old self that was also entirely a fiction, sleek and satisfied as a jungle cat, voice dripping venom.

Thor remembered, then, a day long ago, now nearly a thousand years past, his own self-regard as he caught Loki up from out of the river in his salmon-form, how tears spilled from his brother’s cold, water-attuned eyes. Tears from Loki, who hated above all else for another to see him cry, instead swallowing down all manner of pain and misery.

Thor had been so certain (or, at least, hopeful) that his father would know pride in him, so certain of the Allfather’s approval. In truth, Odin said, and showed, nothing. Rather, the Allfather was reduced to a lightning-ball of fury, every spark of it focused on his youngest son.

On Loki, his poor Loki, who Thor had betrayed.

Their mother kept her own counsel, far away in her palace chambers, her only request that her husband not kill Loki outright, as if that for one moment had been Odin’s plan.

Of the two small boys, her grandsons twice over, delivered by her own hands (while Loki sweated, and shook, and would make no sound, even when his secret place ripped to give them passage, their mother’s Craft doing nothing to ease Loki’s confinement, if she ever meant to ease his suffering at all), she said nothing.

Thor had not believed for a moment she meant to give his young brother ease. He believed she intended the pain as both a caution and a punishment, and he might have tasked her with cruelty, had he not, in his own distress, horrified and entirely overwhelmed, been throwing up off the balcony of Loki’s chamber.

“You have seen enough blood in combat, my son,” Frigga said, when Thor made his shaken way back indoors. “How is this different?”

Wordlessly, Thor lay down beside his brother in the blood-filthy bed, gathering Loki close, noting the way his sweat-soaked hair already reformed once more into its usual soft curls. He smoothed the tumble of curls and waves with his hand—a hand already huge, even then—and kissed Loki’s brow, murmuring in his brother’s ear, “Are you well, youngling? Are you well?”

“Healing,” Loki answered, sounding so very sad, and so weak, Thor’s heart was wounded. Loki pressed himself against Thor’s body, burying his face in Thor’s chest. “Oh, but it hurt, brother. It hurt so terribly. Now I cannot breathe properly, and I understand it not. Tell no one though, please, that I complained?”

“No word shall be spoken,” Thor whispered in return.

Frigga returned with the first of the children, now cleaned of Loki’s blood and dressed in a clout.

“When the moon is high you will go the stables,” she commanded her youngest son. “Take the mule and provisions you find there and go forth from this city. Take care to hide yourself well. Your father’s anger is now without measure. He does not forgive you, or forget that you have disgraced his name and family. He is furious that he has been forced to give his dearest son a sentence of banishment. You, Loki, as you well know, are far from his favorite. You he will kill if he can catch you.”

She laid the second babe on Loki’s belly, and for a mere instant her hardness softened. “Do not let him catch you, my little one. Now give your children suck, lest they cry and be heard. Remember, too, your father expects you at supper. Take your younglings by secret ways to the old nursery, where your own once-nurse will care for them until you return. Above all, your father must not see you leave the feast. He must not know you are gone until you are long gone.”

With that she pinned up a stray wisp of hair, fallen down from its elegant knot, and glided from the chamber, nothing more awry in her dress or demeanor than if she had spent a cool afternoon in the shade of her garden, working at the loom with her gentlewomen.

When she had gone, Loki looked at Thor with great distress. “Brother,” he said, “I know nothing of giving suck, nothing of the rearing of children. I am yet a child myself, though not in my First Childhood. What am I meant to do in the wilderness, alone, with none to guide me?”

“I would go with you, brother,” Thor said. “Though I know scarcely more than you of children, yet I would go.”

“Ah, Thor…” Loki sighed and shut his eyes, looking desperately weary. “I know that you would. But now you are the eldest son, crowned in glory. If you were to go, you would be sought with diligence. I am only a second son, and as such, superfluous. I am far too odd to be wanted anywhere, anyway, and all who know the merest murmur of the story hate me for Baldr’s downfall. You might instead say you saw me, distraught, leap from my balcony into the boiling waters of the abyss and thence vanish from the ken of Asgard.”

“But, Loki, you would not, would you…?” Thor, enrapt, played with the two babies’ tiny toes and petted their down-soft hair.

Oh, such lovely small creatures they were!

“Not at this stage of the game,” Loki answered, in the same lifeless voice. “The snow-haired one is Vali, by the way, brother, and the dark-haired is Narfi, and the difficulty is that I love them dearly. Given that, what else can I do but show them all the love and care I can muster in my foul self?”

“There is nothing foul in you, my dearest one,” Thor murmured into Loki’s ear, and held him near, converting his strength to tenderness and support whilst Loki, clumsily, fed his little ones.

In the end, it was Thor who carried the babes, by secret ways Loki had taught him, up the many stairs. His brother was yet too weak from his ordeal.

It was Loki, dead-pale, but clad in his gorgeous armor, who escorted their mother to the feast. No one remarked on his changed looks—the dread secret, known only to their family, he had concealed by means of potent Glamours for many months. To the others he appeared as he always appeared, as a fragile, white-skinned youth.

Despite his ostentatious entrance, the Allmother on his arm, no one, least of all Thor, saw Loki leave. He spoke no farewells, asked no boons, shed no tears. One moment he was in their company, and the next… he was not.

And five years passed.

Thor was on the sword-grounds, fighting nearly his hardest against Hogun and Fandral both, Sif and Volstagg calling out encouragements to all three swordsmen indiscriminately, when the ravens flew down from his father’s tower in the citadel, landing on Thor’s shoulders.

He shuddered at the grip of their unliving claws on his bare flesh, a touch like cold metal and the chitinous husks of beetles, hating the chittering of their chill voices in his ears.

 _Ride forth, ride forth!_ they cawed. _The wicked one is discovered, along with his monstrous get. Your father awaits at the meeting of the rivers._

With that, they flew from him and it seemed their dark wings extinguished the sun.

Thor knew the meeting of rivers, a secret place of Loki's, and one he loved well. He folded up on the sandy ground, face buried in his hands.

Why? Why would the Allfather not allow things to exist as they were? Nothing had been heard in five years, not a flicker of magic, not a word, and no one but Odin missed Baldr, really.

Baldr had been cruel, not good. Only Odin and Baldr's fool of a wife, Nanna, called him "Baldr the Good."

Baldr was horrid. Thor knew that now.

“Do you ail, my prince?” Sif asked softly, far more formal in her speech than she was wont to be. Out of company, her more usual form of address tended toward, “Thor, you oversized shithead.”

Volstagg’s hand—it must have been Volstagg’s, it was so huge—rested on the back of Thor’s neck. “Fetch a healer. Our prince is ill.”

Thor shook his head violently. "I do not ail. I am not ill. It is only…” His hands fell limply into his lap. “Huginn and Muninn brought dreadful news. My brother has been found.”

“But surely…” began Fandral, forever the dullest-witted of his companions, though many believed that honor to be Volstagg’s. Volstagg, Thor knew, huge and mighty warrior that he was, cultivated foolishness as he cultivated his bristling red beard, to make himself seem less a threat.

“Surely,” poor, confused Fandral went on, “Surely, that is good news, not ill, for now the Allfather may mete out his punishment for Loki’s dishonoring of lost Baldr.”

Volstagg let loose with a word of such resplendent foulness Thor found himself both shocked and impressed. “Punishment for what, exactly, you foolish stripling? For the crime, despite his magic, of being a frail youth overcome by the might of a powerful man with magic of his own? Loki even attempted to destroy himself as honor demanded, and we nearly needed to load him into the healers’ cart with shovels, so he can’t be faulted for not trying his best.”

“Oh,” Sif said. The three glanced from one to another.

Volstagg jerked his head in the direction of the stables. “Go. Fetch for us our steeds. We must be quick in this, as the Allfather demands. Go hastily.”

When they had gone, the warrior took his seat heavily upon the ground, facing Thor. He engulfed one of Thor’s hands in his own and patted it clumsily.

“Dear lad,” he said, “You know there is no victory for your poor brother here?”

Thor shook his head violently.

Volstagg sighed. “I might ‘accidentally’ give you a serious, but not mortal wound, one that would not heal until all this was done with.”

“That would be the coward’s way,” Thor answered.

Volstagg’s genial, crimson face appeared sorrowful, but kind. “How will Loki forgive you, my prince, if you are part of his downfall? Have you thought that perhaps he needs you to remain unsullied in his eyes? I can only see three endings to this sad tale. One, that Loki is not caught. But then what becomes of him? Will he live as a hunted creature always, landless and unloved, until he falls into madness?”

“But his boys…”

“As sure as I swing my sword, they have already died. Odin would never let them live. They are proof of his beloved Baldr’s crime. And keep in mind the Allfather already saw his first son slain—for divers reasons, but mainly to give his favorite a clear road to the throne when he was gone.”

“No,” Thor moaned. “No, no, no…" His father could not be so cold, or so cruel. Could he?

“That leads to the second outcome I see, that your father kills Loki outright. It is not the path he would favor, but one he would pursue, if no other remains. The end he wishes for, I think, is to see Loki suffer, and suffer he will, endlessly and terribly. If you love your brother at all, Thor, I beg of you, do not let this happen. Slay him yourself, if you must. It would be a kindness. Do not leave him to that fate.”

“I thought you loved not my brother,” Thor said, studying his friend’s bluff face, with the deep lines of laughter around the eyes. He had never seen Volstagg look more serious.

The warrior let loose his great, booming laugh. “Your brother is an _ergi_ gob-shite and smart-arse, entirely too big for his breeches. Had he remained among us, I should have doubtless continued to tease him upon every possible occasion. But he is not here, Thor, and he is only a boy. Only a sad mistreated boy, and I rode with your father when he returned from Jötunnheimr, and…” Volstagg fell silent, shaking his head, finally continuing, nonsensically. “He is not spoken of much, these days, but your brother Hodr was a good friend to me. I often rode with him, also, on his embassies to the _Jötnar_ , and found him everything honorable and decent.”

“He was clever, also,” Thor said, remembering sweet Adelheid the goat, and Hodr's saving of Loki’s life with her nourishing milk, though he remembered scarcely another thing from those times, when Loki was a baby, and he himself was so young.

Had Hodr saved Loki for this, for his young brother to die still a youth, and so ignobly?

Thor knew, though it made him craven, or even cruel, he could not raise a hand to harm Loki or take his life. How could he know hope in any form, with Loki gone from the world?

And how, how, could he ever go against the Allfather’s will?

“I wish by all the gods that you would let me wound you,” Volstagg said, almost plaintively, rising once more (with a great deal of grunting) to his immense height. “See, here the others come with our horses.”

“I wish that I had the courage, my friend,” answered Thor.

 

 _Let me go, brother, let me go!_ Salmon-Loki thrashed mightily all along his great, slippery, muscular body, pleading always in Thor’s head. _You know how he will harm me, brother! You know! See how my children lie bleeding?_

But Thor had been terrified, and also proud—jealous, even--of his father’s approval and had held his beloved brother fast, swallowing cowardice, swallowing tears.

Odin would not approve of weeping. Or fondness. Or pity. Or remorse.

Thor, large as he happened to be, was only a boy himself, and much as he hated and feared his father, he loved him too, with a ravenous burning wanting, the Allfather’s approval more necessary to him than his own self-respect, his moral compass, his need for warmth, light, food, air...

As the dragon, Níðhöggr, wound, and twisted, and sucked the life from the roots of the World Tree, Yggdrasil, so the Allfather wound around his sons’ hearts.

“Malice Striker,” aptly, was the meaning of the dragon’s name. It might just as aptly been Odin's, as well.

Loki gasped and trembled in Thor’s arms, his rainbow scales drying to pewter, but he would not return again to his usual shape until Odin, by his own Craft, forced the change.

Thor remembered nothing after. Whether he fell insensible, or would not let the memories enter his mind, he could not have said.

He only knew he returned to himself as he wept harshly against a great stone, and that somewhere, far, far distant, he believed, for a time, he heard Loki’s plump little Vanir friend, Sigyn, weeping too.

“Come, my prince,” Volstagg said at last, wearily. “There’s no help for it now. It is time we rode home.”

“I hear Loki’s Little Mouse,” Thor said. “I hear Sigyn weeping.”

“She went in with him,” the warrior answered. “ _Nornir_ only know how she knew we were here. You can’t hear them, though, Thor. They lie deep in the cavern.”

He brought their horses round, boosting Thor into the saddle.

“There’s no help for it now,” Volstagg repeated.

“My Loki…” Thor’s heart felt like a vast ball of cracked ice, all sharp jags and ragged edges, tearing at him from within. "My Loki. My poor Loki."

“No help,” Volstagg said, and tears stood in his eyes.

After, Thor missed his brother to the point of madness for two hundred years, accusing himself by night and by day for the wrong he had done. It had been Thor’s uncontrolled grief, in the end, that gave Frigga courage at last to petition her husband for her youngest to be set free.

And that was then, when the Allfather’s madness and malice and pride still knew some bounds, when his wife lived to personate for him the voice of reason, and of conscience.

Thor had looked at Hela in the circle of silence, the sound of their plans still ringing in his ears. He regarded Hela's white lace gloves, her pretty white night-dress and velvet slippers, and nearly choked on his own fear.

 _What can you be thinking, my brother?_ he wanted to demand. _Loki, have you lost the last of your senses?_

Hela, just once, blinked her beautiful green eyes (so much like his brother’s when they were young, before hardship put a look in them Thor feared would never again leave him). Such an enchanting small princess of Asgard his niece was!

Then, in the next moment, he saw it, the blood that ran in her, that was his own blood also: the blood of Bors, Odin, Baldr—and the blood of Loki, too.

He saw a child who was not a child, utterly determined, utterly courageous, brilliant and tricksy and fierce as a dragon, with the ice of the _Jötnar_ in her veins, her delicate beauty merely another trick to be used to her advantage. Who would suspect her, ever? She was too exquisite entirely.

The Allfather might as well be a soft dollop of butter to melt in her little hand.

Hela brushed his cheek with the backs of her fingers, rising on her toes to kiss Thor’s other cheek.

“And so, you see,” she told him, in her bright young voice. “Goodnight, Uncle Thor. Goodnight, _Pabbi_.” She rose again to kiss Loki’s cheek. “Sleep well, my darlings, until morning light."


	10. Two Brothers, Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The continuation of Thor's story from the previous chapter...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: grimness ahead. I've tried to keep this within the bounds of good taste, but there's never going to be a "happy part" to the story of Loki, Sigyn and the serpent. Filter that through poor traumatized Thor's POV and... well... tissues and Glenmorangie for everyone? On me.
> 
> Thing 1 and Thing 2 are the Cat in the Hat's companions in mischief, first seen in Dr. Seuss's 1957 children's book, _The Cat in the Hat._
> 
> The Bronx Zoo, the fourth largest zoo in the world (the second largest in the U.S.), opened to the public in 1899. It's located inside Bronx Park in the New York City borough of the Bronx, and includes 265 acres of park lands and naturalistic habitats. "Great Apes" are the primates most closely related to humans, namely gorillas, orangutans, and chimpanzees.
> 
> "vamoose"=to leave in a hurry  
> The word was derived in the mid-19th century from the Spanish word _vamos_ , meaning "let us go."
> 
> In the Marvel Universe, the Dwarves are a race of skilled forgers and blacksmiths who lived in the Realm of Nidavellir until Thanos killed them and injured their King, Eitri. In Norse Mythology, the Dwarves (with whom Loki had several run-ins) are said to live in Niðavellir and/or Svartálfaheimr, and are synonymous with the Dark Elves ("Dökkálfar") and Black Elves ("Svartálfar").
> 
> In 1974 Frank Zappa released a song " _Don't Eat the Yellow Snow_ ," which contains the immortal lyrics "Watch out where the huskies go, and don't you eat that yellow snow." Oddly enough, that's pretty much the least objectionable part of the song, which is chock-full of Inuit stereotypes.
> 
> "warms the cockles" (an abbreviated version of "warms the cockles of my heart")=to warm one's deepest feelings (though it's being used here to signify warming up thoroughly after being really, really cold). "Cockles" is a corruption of the Latin term _cochleae cordis"_ , meaning ventricles (the lower two chambers of the human heart, responsible for pumping blood from the heart to the body). The ventricles were thought to be snail-shaped, and the Latin word _cochlea_ means snail.
> 
> "bambinos"=boys  
>  _Bambino_ (Italian) is the Italian masculine form of the word for "baby." The Italian plural is _bambini_ , but as the word has crept into commmon English use, we've come to use the standard "s at the end" plural.

* * *

As Thor put on the coffee to brew, as he supervised Jöri’s careful packing of his and his brother’s backpacks for their day of schooling and stirred dried cranberries, cinnamon and finely-chopped apple into the breakfast oatmeal, he considered Loki’s and Hela’s plans and wished with his whole heart that that his niece, strong as she was, determined as she might be, could be safe at home, guarded and loved in the heart of her family.

Thor only wanted all his dearest ones near, where he could watch over them, love them, protect them from harm, and yet he feared, in that, he had failed and failed again.

Had he been a proper guardian, Loki would not now be in the state he was in. His brother was rash. He thought never, in these days, for his own well-being, and Thor felt his own failures to shield him keenly.

A proper brother would protect Loki from his own mad courage and headstrong ways. A proper brother would ward off the evil ones who meant Loki harm.

No matter what others believed, Loki had always been the strong one, the brave one, as well as the clever one. What did Thor have but lightning, a magical hammer and the power of his two arms? He might as well have been born one of the Great Apes he had visited with his nephews at the Bronx Zoo. The rest might be taken from him so easily, as he had already seen.

And what he been without his magical tools? Tasered into oblivion by the diminutive, sharp-voiced Darcy. Not the worst moment of his life, but surely amongst that listing.

His poor Loki. His dear, dear Loki. Why could he not care for him better than he did?

A sharp memory returned to Thor: the grim gray mountain of bare stone, its sides devoid of so much of a scrap of lichen or moss. The great boulder that blocked the cavern's mouth, tall as his own height and Volstagg’s combined.

He had whirled and struck the great stone, with Mjolnir’s might as well as all his own, until a long, sharp note rang out like the voice of a terrible bell and the rock splintered into a million shards, the passage to the underground suddenly revealed before them.

Terror flowed into Thor in a noxious wave, along with the uncovered cavern-mouth's stale breath. He feared no creature in battle, yet he feared to enter there, both for the place itself and for what he was bound to find within its darkness. “Prince Thor,” Volstagg said quietly, unaccustomedly somber. “Shall we leave this place, or shall we enter?”

“I shall not enter there,” said his mother the queen, in a voice that held the merest flutter of unease in its usual steady timbre. Her face remained calm, undisturbed as ever, her hair and garments perfectly arranged.

“My son. My youngling," she continued, after a moment's pause, her sorrow this time palpable, despite the steadiness of her tone. "I dare not see him, in this moment, as he must be.”

“Aye,” Thor answered. What more was to be said? Her love was real (though he had often wondered), he saw that now, but it was also a crippled thing, only as strong as it was able to be.

For two centuries he’d honed his anger against her, but now he saw how senseless that had been. Yes, she had failed Loki terribly—and so had he. The blame must be divided equally between them.

With a gesture Frigga lit the torch Volstagg carried, the red of her _seiðr_ flaring briefly around her gray-garbed form. “Be safe,” she said formally, in a queen’s voice, not a mother’s, “Bold warriors of Asgard.”

Thor strode into the cavern without a farewell, Volstagg hurrying after, torch held aloft. Their path sloped steeply downward into darkness, the footing uneven, slick with damp and littered with stones, the air they breathed both sharp and bitter with the odors of lime and dank water.

The torch shook in Volstagg’s hand, making their shadows, already crabbed and grotesque against the jagged walls, dance with evil appearance.

“I am sore afraid,” Volstagg said, quiet-voiced. “I know not why. I have walked these halls before.”

Thor glanced at his companion, surprised to see his broad, high-spirited, ruddy face drawn and pale.

“I hung the serpent above your brother’s head,” Volstagg confessed. “The crone who supplied the creature could not reach. I was the only man in the party of sufficient height.” He paused, the torchlight jittering more than ever. “Thor, I... I feared the king. I can give no other excuse.”

“We all fear the king,” Thor replied, and in his heart he hated his father with passion yet, to his own sick dismay, loved him still. “And you love not my brother.”

“It was not for that.” The warrior paused again. “Loki had… has… a cleverness that cuts like acid or steel. He is only a child. Few men like a child with that sort of wit. It makes them feel… lesser, I suppose. As if they were judged by one too young to know anything, who, against nature, knows more than they know. It is like a burr under a horse’s saddle, always galling until removed. Many wished your brother removed, Thor. Yet I understand now, Loki hid his cleverness as best he could. It would simply burst out of him, beyond control. It was the only weapon he had to defend himself, poor boy.”

“Yes,” Thor agreed, repeating within himself, _Poor boy. My poor Loki_. “Your words are wise, my friend.”

Volstagg huffed out a bitter laugh. “Do not become accustomed, my prince. It will not happen often.”

The descended for a time in silence, until the big warrior said. “It was not right, what Baldr did to him. His own kin, blood or not, of his father’s house, and only a child. It was not decent. One would hear him crying…”

 _Would one?_ Thor thought. _I never did. Not once._

 _Because Loki would not let you_ , Thor’s inner voice supplied. _Always, he protected you. If you had_ _heard, it would have led to words, and more than words, with Baldr, and though now you are_ _crown prince, you were ever second to your elder in your father’s eyes._

Everyone was second to Baldr, even Hodr, who ought to have been king one day.

“Halt, my prince,” Volstagg said quietly. “We are near, and…”

Thor stopped. The quiet was uncanny, though the stones around them seemed to tremble slightly. The torchlight caught golden glimmers amongst the dull sand and gravel of the floor, a little cup of two handles, Dwarven-wrought of gold and intricately patterned. Sigyn’s cup, once a treasure of her father’s household.

She lay, as if sleeping, against a boulder, her warm gray mantle pulled over her head and face. “Little Mouse,” Loki always called her, with great love, his sweet, small friend, forever with him as he came and went, the top of her head scarcely as high as the middle of Loki’s chest. A plump, shy creature with smooth brown hair and great brown eyes, who always seemed so plain seen close to, but from a distance, laughing and talking with his brother, became loveliness itself.

“Sigyn,” Thor said hoarsely. “Maid, how goes it with you?”

She did not reply. Of course she did not reply.

Volstagg passed Thor the torch and, kneeling, folded back the girl's mantle.

Sigyn was dead, as Thor had known she would be.

She had died plump no longer, but bone-thin and aged, her once-smooth hair grizzled-gray and ratted.

“Oh, maid,” Volstagg breathed, and reached a hand to palm shut her staring eyes. “Oh, maid, here died the only one amongst us with true warrior’s courage, worthy of a warrior’s name. Blessings upon your great heart, small one.”

In the end, it appeared, this harsh fate had proved too much even for Sigyn’s valor. In the end, the Vanir maiden had taken her cup, not to wantonly empty, as she had done again and again and again to save Loki pain (her small hands burned to the bone by venom), but as her final draught of drink.

The effects were terrible. Thor’s gorge rose, and he controlled it only with great effort. “Sweet maid," he choked out, "Many were your virtues.”

Volstagg removed his cloak and, lifting Sigyn’s body, laid it gently upon the thick fabric, wrapping her with great tenderness in its commodious folds.

“My prince,” he said, his voice choked as Thor’s, “Note this: the body is yet warm. One day less, one hour less…”

“I cannot think of that, Volstagg,” Thor answered. “It is too much. I cannot.” He returned the torch to his friend.

It was not far from that place, then, to the one of three sharp stones, where his brother lay in fetters and the serpent dripped its venom with dread monotony. Not far, yet the longest and weariest journey Thor had ever undertaken.

“Loki?” Thor called, his voice nearly high and weak as a child’s. “Loki, my dearest brother, do you hear my voice?”

That which had been Loki lay arched over the stones, their sharp points scraping into his back, as they must have scraped a million times before. Nothing remained in him, Thor thought, of the boy he had known. His brother’s lush black hair was entirely gone, burned away, he supposed. His fair, fair skin, stretched tightly over the lumps and angles of his bones, showed weirdly greenish in the torchlight.

“Go no further, my prince,” Volstagg said suddenly, sharply. “The serpent has grown!”

In the same instant Thor saw the evil thing, grossly huge, the sick white of an enormous maggot.

What had fed it so? Did it gorge itself fat on misery and pain alone?

His companion’s sword rang out, severing the serpent’s head from its body, and Volstagg flung himself backward, taking Thor along with him, the two of them landing hard, in a tangle, upon the rocky cavern floor.

The serpent’s head landed near Thor’s face, mouth open, silver eyes glinting, as if it laughed at his consternation. He scrambled to his feet and, with Mjolnir, pounded the evil visage to a ribbon of flesh.

Volstagg then burned the ribbon to ash with his torch.

“You will laugh,” the warrior confessed. “For I feared the serpent's head would reattach somehow, and the beast rise again, even stronger than before.”

Thor did not laugh. His heart had held the same fears.

The serpent’s body, thick as Volstagg’s thigh, gave two last, sharp snaps and hung still, stretching from the lofty cavern ceiling to form a long, bloody trail upon the floor.

“Take the vile thing down,” Thor commanded. “Destroy it by fire, Volstagg, my friend, whilst I swiftly attend to my brother.”

Some ancient, trembling kernel of fear within him made Thor not wish to touch that which lay upon the stones. Only the length of body and limb, and the pallor of the skin, gave any reminder of the brother who shared his youth.

Thor pulled a flask from his cloak, its contents a potion of his mother’s devising. He began where the serpent’s venom, in its death throes, had sprayed constellations of red across Loki’s shoulders and chest, the poison eating slow ulcers into his skin.

The potion would not heal, it had not that power, but it would (Frigga’s word) neutralize, stopping further burning. Lastly, he poured a thick stream where Loki’s face—his handsome, charming, beloved face --had been.

Now there was no face at all, no smooth, pale skin, no black-fringed lids to close in sleep, no shining eyes, no straight, aristocratic nose, only the heart-shaped opening to Loki’s skull where the nose had been.

No lips smiled back at him. Where his brother’s jaw hung open (because it lacked the muscles, now, to hold it shut), only Loki’s once-strong, white teeth showed, pitted with acid, guarding no soft warm redness within, no clever tongue.

Scraps of twisted muscle, for the most part, concealed the outer bones of the skull, no doubt the result of Loki's body making desperate struggle to regenerate something against the never-ending fall of poison.

And still his brother’s limbs moved restlessly, if minutely. His chest rose and fell with fast, shallow breaths.

A lesser god, a man of Midgard or many another Realm would have died, and counted his end a blessing.

Loki could only suffer, and suffer again.

As their father well knew.

Thor became speechless in his hatred for Odin, as if his own tongue had burned within his mouth.

Still, he poured the potion as carefully as he could with his trembling hands, one too weak to perform the task without the other’s aid. A steam or smoke rose, so noxious it made Thor’s eyes tear, his throat burn. Behind him he heard Volstagg retch, and then Loki’s skeletal hand shot out, quick as the striking of a snake, gripping hard around Thor’s wrist.

In a moment it struck Thor that which (despite the motion and the breathing) he had not brought himself to fully believe. His brother lived. He lived and felt. His brother lived and felt, and had felt all this, without respite, for two hundred _fjanndinn_ years.

Thor fell to his knees and vomited, Loki’s bony hold still tight round his arm, vomited again and again, as if the sickness would never leave him. It was not the sight of his brother that affected him so, neither was it the smell, dreadful though it was, nor the serpent, nor the dank horror of the place that contained him.

It was that this had been done to Loki, with conscious thought, with will, with planning, knowing exactly what would befall the boy. A boy who, in thought and deed, had never brought true harm to anyone.

And he, Thor, had blindly said, "I love you, father," and, "I bow to your will, father," and had brought to this the one who loved him most in all the Realms.

The one he loved most in return.

 _He_ had done this to his brother, to his beloved Loki. He was the one who had caught him, perhaps the only one who could have caught him, Loki’s wit, his defenses, somewhat dulled in his salmon-form. His instincts informing him familiar, friend when he should have trusted no one.

“Oh, Loki, Loki, forgive me now,” Thor begged. “Forgive me and I promise and swear I shall forgive any wrong you do to me, or to anyone, for as long as we both shall live.”

He knew not if his brother heard him. Loki’s ears had gone along with all the rest.

Thor heard a dreadful, dry, rasping, bubbling sound and greatly feared it was the noise of Loki laughing.

 

Thor jerked out of painful memory, trembling a little and feeling sick, the boys both staring at him with great green eyes exactly like his brother's.

“Tummy sad?” Fen asked sympathetically, which seemed to sum up all Thor’s troubles in the fewest possible words.

“Forgive me, dearest nephews.” Thor wiped his eyes on the back of one hand. “Have you ever come to remember a thing which brought back to you all your worst feelings in one heartbeat?”

“Fauxlicarrier,” Fen said.

Jöri nodded solemnly. “Yes, my brother. And also when the wicked liar Ghost in the Wall whispered in the grown ones' ears. And when daddy drank for so long to excess.”

Tony exploded out of the bedroom then, recklessly dragging one of those small, wheeled cases at his heels, the sort Midgardians seemed to regard almost as a fifth limb, utterly indispensable for travel.

He stopped, face stricken at Jöri’s words, shoulders slumping.

Perhaps all of us, Thor thought, Have committed acts not easily forgiven.

“Oh, by all your frickin' gods, Thor,” Tony proceeded, as if he’d heard nothing, though his voice shook with emotion held in, and his stance did not straighten. “I’m so damn late. I was up with your bro half the night and overslept by a million years, and this guy, Devane, I’m going to see in Chicago is a hard… uh… bottom of the highest order…”

Both boys, in the way of younglings, giggled.

“The words ‘reschedule due to family illness’ are not in this b-hole’s vocabulary. Where’s Hap? Have you seen Hap? Is he here?”

“He keys himself in as we speak,” Thor answered, his balance nearly recovered, though the sick feeling lingered in his stomach. As the portly man-of-security ambled in, he handed his brother-inlaw two insulated lunch sacks. “The red contains hot items, red for hot, oatmeal and a muffin, a second muffin for Happy. The muffins have bacon and cheese in. You will enjoy them. The yellow contains cold items, yellow for…”

Thor stopped. He’d had a "yellow is for…" had he not? If he thought of it, even for a second, if he let the least of the memories in, his mind desired to return to whirling confusion.

“Don’t eat yellow snow?” Happy suggested. “What? Snow is cold.”

Thor’s nephews giggled again. He set a bowl of oatmeal in front of each, in hopes of full mouths containing their mirth.

“Juice and water,” he concluded. “Does my brother yet sleep, Shield-brother Tony? Does he hunger or thirst for aught?”

Tony glanced confusedly about his home. “I thought he was out here with you. By… uh… crikey… if he’s snuck off to Steve and Bucky-britches again…

“Boss,” Happy interrupted. “Dr. Boss is on the terrace, and you’re not driving again ‘til you get glasses. For reals. Now kiss your hubby goodbye and let’s vamoose. You’re gonna lose your departure time for the StarkJet and have to fly commercial if you don’t move it, like, now.

Tony gave each of the boys a quick, tight hug and a large kiss. “Love ya, Fenny. Love ya, Jo-Jo. Learn lots and don’t give your uncle any grief."

He headed off for the sliding glass doors almost at a run, muttering under his breath, “Dammit, Lok, what were you thinking? It’s frigid out there.”

After a moment’s thought, Thor followed. His brother despised to be scooped up and carried like a child, but what was necessary was necessary. He had carried Loki on many occasions.

Including the one he would not think of, up out of the dark and into the light again, where their mother waited with her potions and spells, though still a hundred years of healing lay ahead.

And with it the screams that never entirely left his ears…

"Baby? Hey, Baby?" Tony knelt at Loki’s feet, rubbing his hand to warm it. With the other hand Loki clutched a book, a journal perhaps, pressing it tightly to his chest. His face displayed clear signs of weeping.

“Loki. Dearest brother, what is amiss?” Again, it smote Thor’s heart how frail and ill Loki appeared (though not so fragile as that time, no, no, never again). He otherwise looked half-frozen. Could he truly have forgotten he now lacked a  _Jötunn's_ tolerance for cold?

Asking no man’s leave, Thor raised his brother gently from his seat, steering him back into the warmth of the penthouse and setting him into the large chair Loki favored, an ottoman (which was both a footstool and a past empire, Thor had learned) beneath his feet. The boys came running with a warm, puffy quilt from the nearest of the bedrooms, which Thor tucked gently round Loki's body and legs.

“How fare you, my brother?” he asked quietly.

Loki did not answer. His face looked both young, and harrowed, with the look of one lost in some far off and long ago place. He trembled with suppressed emotion and the chill.

To Thor’s surprise, he glanced up to see Clint standing silent at the chair’s other side. When had the archer arrived at the penthouse? Why, of all Thor's Shield-Brothers, had he come here at this time?

He watched Clint gently prise the brown-clad book from Loki’s stiff grip.

“You know, you have an unfortunate tendency to beat yourself up about things you could no way help,” Clint scolded Loki, though in a kind enough way, the way of a brother. “Let it go, kiddo. Let it sink in. Breathe a little. I’m gonna take your bambinos to school so Thor can stay with you. Kiss Iron Pants there goodbye. He’ll make his meeting and you can process. Afterwards you can tell him the whole thing. And Thor, he could really use a hit of that ginger tea you make for him. Warms the cockles, right, Lok?”

“Christ, I can’t leave now,” Tony protested, as the boys made sounds of protest too. “I can’t, guys! When he’s like this? When I don’t know what’s happening? No way!”

“Forgive me, dearest husband,” Loki said, softly and more formally than was his wont in addressing Tony. “I was quite shaken, but now am ever warmer, and well. The book was a journal written by the father of my blood, and has aroused many thoughts within my mind. I will surely tell all to you, _hjarta hjarta minn_ , but for now… I seek to put order to those thoughts, and have many questions I would ask of my…” He looked sidelong at Thor. “Brother. Many things, in my youth, I may perhaps have misremembered. “And so, kiss me sweetly now, that I may hold it in memory until your return. Then we shall exchange many words, beloved, and all shall be made clear.”

They kissed, and it did appear most sweet, though Tony also bore the look of one hurt and confused.

The boys hurried in to kiss and embrace both their parents, Clint exhorting them, “C’mon, Thing 1 and Thing 2, grab your backpacks and let’s scoot.”

Happy Hogan’s words to Tony, though phrased more respectfully, scarcely differed.

And, in a mere moment, they two brothers were alone.

Waiting for Loki to speak, Thor connected the electric kettle to its outlet. Still waiting, he collected the breakfast dishes, his utensils and pots and pans, rinsed them and set them within the machine.

Continuing to wait, he set Loki’s tea in the pot to steep, then wiped down the counters. He set the teapot and Loki’s mug on a tray, filling a second large mug with coffee, to which he added sugar and cream. He carried it all to the common area, setting his tray on the short table meant for such repasts.

“Will you come drink tea with me, brother?” Thor asked.

Loki made his way shakily to the sofa, trailing his quilt, then nearly falling into Thor’s lap.

“My poor Loki,” Thor murmured, kissing his temple. “My poor brother.” Loki’s skin was not cold at all, but hot and dry. Perhaps the heat had driven him outdoors?

“But I am not your brother,” Loki said sadly.

“That again?” Thor asked, attempting to keep humor in his voice. “I thought we had pledged to set our own definitions, Loki.”

Loki sighed, “I know you like not greatly to read, dear Thor, but peruse that book if you would, as a boon to me, then tell me it is not madness I discerned within. Tell me if what is written might be true. Perhaps you remember more than I am able, as you are older. For now…” Loki gave a shudder. “I must sleep. I must.”

Thor leaned forward, taking the book into his hand. Its pages were of creamy parchment, the Vanir script inscribed in a deeply black ink, written in a fine, scholarly hand.

A hand he knew well. Hodr’s hand, often seen still in legal documents of Asgard.

Thor remembered his father’s opinion of old: “My eldest son Hodr--a weak warrior, but a powerful scribbler of words. Perhaps he is meant for a diplomat. At the least it would take him out from under our feet.”

And later, spat out in venomous fury as Thor hid, very small and terribly frightened, just behind the throne “Do you expect your half-blood brat to be welcomed here, Hodr? You, who consents to mate with monsters? You, who bring blackest disgrace to my house and lineage?”

“Oh, father,” Hodr replied, with no trace of temper. “I could only love who I must love. Say what you will, my beloved is no monster to me.”

Thor could not remember what else Hodr said in return, though in his mind the tone was restrained, his words kind, as Hodr’s words had always been kind.

He did recall that their father struck gentle Hodr with the butt of _Gungnir_ , his spear, and the narrow red ribbons of blood, when he peeped out, streaming down Hodr’s cheek.

Hodr, the eldest, who ought to have been king after their father. Who would have been wise, just, a bringer of prosperity, peace, new creation, instead of bitterness, envy, hatred, war.

Thor remembered Hodr coming to the nursery with his cup of goat’s milk and his pap, the patient way he taught Thor how to feed what he had called “his baby” or “his Loki” in those days, ensuring that infant Loki would no longer waste away.

He remembered Hodr holding Loki against his chest, the gentle way he rubbed Loki's back as, sated, the baby slept peacefully for the first time in many days.

"He's a handsome little man, wouldn't you say, Thor? Do you think he resembles me?"

 _Why should he resemble you?_ Thor had wondered, but he smiled because Hodr was a kind brother, and had saved his poor baby.

"Maybe," he said, trying not to sound doubtful.

"I am asking you a solemn boon, little brother," Hodr said next. "Will you love Loki and care for him always? He has no one but you in all the Realms, dearheart. If you make a vow to me you must keep it. You know that, Thor, do you not?"

"I would never break a vow," Thor answered, a touch indignantly, running a hand over Loki's soft black curls. "He is my Loki, and I will always love and care for him. I swear."

Thor glanced up into Hodr's warm green eyes, seeing something there he understood but, at the same time did not. Hodr loved Loki too, loved him even so much as Thor did--but how could he?

They scarcely knew one another.

He remembered watching from the Nursery window as Hodr set out on his final voyage, his ship floating gently toward the abyss, and how the million bright golden lights of his released spirit raced toward the stars.

“He must have been a very great man,” Loki said, impressed.

“He was our brother,” Thor had answered.

Only now, he suspected, that had not exactly been true.


	11. That's All, Folks!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Despite the title, this is far from the end of the story. ;)
> 
> Tony Stark doesn't need any stinking business partners, but he does really, _really_ need to know what's happening back home at the tower, because what's happening back home is in no way good. As Loki's Christmas gift to Steve continues to backfire, Cap has a hard time getting his priorities straight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Clint's circus was actually called _Carson Carnival of Traveling Wonders_ \--only the circus part, in which Clint displayed his marksmanship skills, was mostly a cover for the other "circus employees" stripping each town they visited bare of valuables while the "rubes" were enjoying the show.
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> " _Anything You Can Do _" is from the musical _Annie Get Your Gun _(1946) by Irving Berlin.____
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* * *

In the limo, on his way from the airport to Devane’s, Tony got a text from Clint:  _whos hodor_

Tony rapid-texted:  _Punctuation is our friend?_

 _A-hle_ Clint shot back. _Who’s Hodor?_

_Giant dude on G of T. Man of 1 word. Carries kid?_

_G of T?_

_Game of Thrones. How’s life under that rock where you live, C.?_

_Nope,_ Clint texted.

Then, nearly a minute later, a second text: _Seriously serious here, T._

A third, after an even more extended pause: _Avengers Assemble! Central Park. Sheep Meadow or environs._

Environs? Clint really must have been spending a bunch of time in Loki's head. He sure as hell hadn't learned that word at the _Carson Carnival of Traveling Grand Theft._

Tony replied: _For reals?_

_Not good w extra bad sauce, T. Suit up for crazy SpaceViking._

_Mine?_ Tony's stomach turned over. For a second he thought he might actually throw up, right there in the back of the rented limo, without benefit of one of Hap's handy upholstery-protecting tarps. His hands started sweating so much he could hardly hold the phone, and his heart seemed to be getting ready to gallop out of his chest.

 _Nope. I'd suit up lightning-proof, though_ , Clint added.

 _Not Loki, not Loki, thank the Norns._ For the first time in a couple weeks or more, Tony really, really wanted a drink. Correction--a bunch of drinks, only that was so not the way he was going to handle this thing. Not now. Not ever.

"Quoth the raven, 'Nevermore'."

That the problem appeared to be his bro-in-law, okay, that was pretty bad. That the problem _wasn't_ his husband made the situation something he could deal with. And thanks to the modern miracle of the cell phone, he could text back, _Got it, C._ , cool as a cucumber and no one but Hap (maybe) would be the wiser.

Tony sat for a second, telling his heartbeat it needed to slow down, like, now, wiping his sweaty hands one by one on his pants as he nervously tapped his StarkPhone against his lower lip.

This had to do with that fucking book. He knew it. The book his husband had clung to on the terrace for dear life, then passed on to his brother to read.

The book that contained something major enough to rattle Loki’s cage like King Kong with ‘Roid Rage and now, apparently, send generally placid-tempered Thor straight over the edge into an unscheduled performance of Lightning in the Park.

Something Asgardian, that was a given. Something about Loki’s birth father, Laufey?

Given Loki’s ongoing issues with his heritage, Tony knew next to nothing about the dude, beyond that he was big, blue and (he inferred) dead.

But why, by all the gods of the Golden Realm, would Thor care that much about Laufey one way or another? He was protective of his baby brother, sure, but protective to the point he'd lose his godly shit all over Central Park? For Thor, that just wasn't in character.

Tony knew he shouldn’t have left. Despite what Loki said, he’d been picking up a… vibe (to use a word from his youth) and not a Beach Boys’ “ _Good Vibrations_ ,” kind of vibe, either.

Not only from his husband, who despite his perfectly reasonable words had been sending out something near desperation, mingled with a pungent sadness, but from his brother-in-law too.

And, what the hell, he was Tony-fuckin’-Stark! Why had he gone to Devane in the first place? Why hadn’t Devane come to him? The guy was a jerkwad of the first order anyway, he had nothing to offer that Tony really needed, nothing he couldn't work out on his own, and better, given a spare five minutes of his time.

Not to mention, his husband wasn’t well, and he had young children at home who needed him, especially with Loki under the weather.

This time, he'd determined, Loki wasn't going to have to struggle his way through anything. Until he was healthy (and by that, Tony meant really, really healthy), his parental duties were kisses, cuddles and stories. Maybe a little homework-help if he was having a particularly good day. That was it. End of story.

Also, realistically, even if Tony used every single ounce of his ingenuity working out how to spend all the money he already had, extended over the course of ten lifetimes (keeping in mind his golden, fruity wedding gift from Loki), he probably wouldn’t actually be able to do so—he was that filthy, stinking rich. Why the hell hadn’t he waved a hand, and made Devane come to him?

He wasn't bored. He wasn't even antsy. He'd been away too long from his family already before Christmas, getting sober, and had missed them like crazy. Even a droopy, miserable, morning-sick Loki sharing his bed was a million times better than anything he'd had before (okay, maybe not a million times better than Pepper, but she loved them both and would understand what he meant).

With still slightly-shaky fingers, he texted: _Hey, Devane--no deal. "Anything you can do, I can do better. I can do anything Better than you." Looking forward to rendering your lousy patents obsolete! Most Sincerely, Tony Stark_

That accomplished, he attempted to hold himself still as possible, the better to tune into the family grapevine.

Under most circumstances, Tony only picked up the Thor Channel when he was within, say, ten miles of the guy--and the closer, the better. Usually what he'd catch was a low-level hum of contentment and protectiveness, with an occasional recipe thrown in for good measure, nothing even close in intensity to what he got from Loki or the kiddoes, or often even from Kurt or Clint, the other main subscribers to Loki’s psychic party line (another thing from his distant past, the better for folks to listen in on their neighbors' private business—at one time it had been Great-Aunt Agatha’s number one hobby, the old lady did enjoy her gossip).

The presences, even the strong ones, weren’t disruptive, they just occupied a little spot in the back of Tony’s brain that he apparently hadn’t been using for anything until Loki came into his life, and he could pay them more or less attention as he chose. It was a bit like his mental MP3 player, preloaded with Heavy Metal favorites and the American Top 40 lists of the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s, providing a constant, non-intrusive, background to his thoughts.

His conscious mind could work on a sticky problem with his suit propulsors while “ _Tainted Love_ ” played on low through this mental StarkTunes player and in some other room Loki tried to figure out how to eat a kumquat, _Does one peel it first, or merely bite, or…? Oh! Bitter! Bitter! I do not care for this terrible thing of deception, so very unlike a small misshapen orange, and not as I had thought in any way_!

Loki’s happy or curious thoughts always came with a great many exclamation points. His unhappy thoughts either tended to get snatched back suddenly from Tony’s mind, or else, if Loki couldn’t manage a more deliberate censorship at that particular moment, to be deliberately muddied, so Tony knew they were there, but couldn’t read their contents. Right now, what he was picking up from his husband (made dim by the distance) was the Okeefenokee Swamp of muddied thoughts.

 _Loki?_ He tried. _Lok, it’s Tony. Lok, what’s wrong? I’m worried! Answer, please?_

“Boss, what’s up?” Happy glanced into the rear-view mirror, his brow creased, brown eyes worried. “Boss, you okay? You don’t look so hot.”

Tony gripped the handle on the inside of his door, as if that would somehow give his mind leverage for louder thinking. _Loki! Please! Loki!_

No response, just more mud, a landslide’s worth of mud, pushing him further and further from his husband’s badly-troubled mind.

_LOKI! BABE!_

The mud didn’t just slide, it exploded, not into wetness, but into intense, raging flame, and suddenly Tony’s own mind was ripping open, torn apart by noise and static and PAIN.

 _oh I killed him oh I killed him oh gods oh gods oh_ Nornir _judge me not I killed him_

Then there weren’t any more words, just the the fire and the horrible pain, growing and growing and growing until Tony couldn’t move, couldn’t think, could only watch the expensive leather back of the front seat rush up to meet his face. And… the last, lingering thing in his head, a stupid, pointless, cartoon image of a plump little pig in a round frame, waving jauntily as crazy music played.

“Th-Th-Th-that’s all folks!” was all Porky Pig had to say.

* * *

Steve would fully admit, he’d been shirking his duties. Spending every moment he could force himself to stay awake and eyes open with his long-lost friend. He hadn’t paid attention to anything else, least of all to his responsibilities as leader of the Avengers. There'd been no drills, no team meetings. He hadn’t wanted to pay attention to anything, really, especially as, day by day, Bucky became a little bit more his true self.

Bucky said it was like archaeology, hour by painstaking hour, a bit more dust and crud brushed or scraped away from the buried real James Buchanan Barnes inside his head.

Steve knew most of this gentle brushing and scraping had to be Loki’s doing, this slow excavation of his dear, old friend, his brother in all but blood. He also knew Loki was very much not well, in large part because of Bucky’s rescue, but also because (although Steve never ceased to find this somewhat confusing) he was in the middle of one of the most difficult stages of carrying a child.

All of that, his duties as captain of the team, showing a decent amount of caring for the well-being of both Loki and his little unborn son, should have been of foremost importance in his mind.

Only they weren’t.

All he could think about was his own loneliness, and Bucky.

Especially Bucky.

Even Loki’s buddy, Kurt, the nice young German fellow, had kindly and politely asked him to back off.

“Your friend James has all he needs here,” he’d said, earnestness all over his strange, yet rather charming face. “Captain Rogers, you know he is safe, here where you can look after him. I can sympathize well with your emotions—I can only imagine if it were _mein lieber Freund_ Loki in that situation, how anxious I would be to see him restored to himself—yet you must show a little patience. Loki is not well enough at this time, Captain. Think of his family. His small children. Think of the little one he carries inside him.”

But Steve, God save his soul, hadn’t cared about that. Not enough to make a difference, at any rate, although he was well along the path, again, to liking the so-called god of mischief very much indeed, just as he’d liked—even loved, in a way—Captain Friggason.

Steve remembered telling Captain Friggason (that first night of their race across Germany, when--his men pushed to their last limits--they’d finally stopped in the wee hours to grab an hour or so of sleep) that he’d only ever wanted to be in the army and serve his country. It had, he'd said, been his only dream.

The British captain had smiled at him.

No offense was meant, clearly, but he’d let himself be offended, mostly because even he was tired and hungry and, maybe, also a little scared that, for all his Super Soldier prowess, they weren’t going to make it to France no matter how hard they fought along the way. He especially didn't want to survive himself, but lose all his brave men.

Also because (although he’d told himself not to be overly impressed with the Brit, legend or no legend) he seemed to be coming down, regardless, with a bad case of hero worship.

“I suppose someone like you thinks that’s quaint, Friggason.”

“Someone like me, dear Captain?” Capt. Friggason returned, his smile changing, becoming a little amused, yet a little sad at the same time. “On the contrary, Steven, my family fully intended me for a career in the military. As a child, I took in the absolute importance of duty and honor and physical might along with my breakfast porridge. My people think little of scribblers and readers of books, and I always preferred to read above all other pursuits. I’m rather a disappointment, by their reckoning.”

“So, what are you?”

“Beg pardon?” For just a second Capt. Friggason seemed completely caught off guard, shocked even.

“Instead, I mean. In civilian life, what are you? What do you do?”

“Oh, yes, I see.” Friggason gave a quiet laugh—not at Steve, but at himself, it seemed, at a joke Steve didn't get.

“Indeed. What do I do? In civilian life, before the war, I was a Doctor of Archaeology. I attempted to fill in the holes in history. Also, I study ancient languages. You might say words are my passion.”

“The fancy ones? Greek? Latin?”

The Brit gave a second soft laugh. “Fancy? Would it surprise you to hear that the soldiers of Ancient Rome wrote the same words, in their own tongue, on latrine walls that your soldiers use to deface theirs? Time has put a gloss of politeness on the past that simply wasn’t so, Captain Rogers. I like to chip off that gloss bit by bit, and take a peek at the real world beneath, in all its squalor and splendor.”

For the rest of the brief, tense pause, at the edge of some unknown field, in some unknown part of enemy territory, Friggason spun out the tale of a village on the banks of a peat bog, uncovered bit by slow bit, with patience and care, the story of a people who hadn’t lived for thousands of years, but left for Captain Friggason’s understanding eyes a message so clear it might as well have been written for him in a book.

Steve had been mesmerized by the tale. It opened his eyes. He’d always thought history was spelled with capital letters, that it was all battles, presidents, dynasties, dates meant to be committed to memory. He’d never thought of the slow, beautiful, often-uncharted ebb and swell of time, the stories of ordinary people, often without names, living out lives that were amazing because all of life is amazing, short or long, rich or poor, perfect or imperfect.

The passion Captain Friggason had for archaeology was the same passion Steve felt now. He wanted to stay glued to this one site, spending every minute with Bucky, watching the good man his friend really was emerge from the Winter Soldier’s ruins.

His real Bucky was there with him, as he now was more and more often, and they’d started a chat about nothing in particular, the New York of their childhood and the old times in general, the number of different kinds of beer you could buy in the supermarket nowadays, many of them with genuinely funny names.

Suddenly, Bucky gave a hard flinch, snapping at once into fight or flight mode, his muscles tense as steel girders. “Holy Toledo, Steve, what was that?”

“What was what?” Steve asked, smiling easily. “Nothing, Buck. You need to calm down. ‘Chill,’ as they say these days.”

The next moment, though, he heard thunder. Heavy, loud, rolling, threatening thunder—loud enough, even, to shake the barrier of the Hulk Tank, and the heavy walls of the antechamber.

“Nothing, huh?” Bucky tapped the fingers of his metal hand against the barrier, also a weirdly threatening sound.

It reminded Steve of the noise of the deathwatch beetle, in Edgar Allan Poe, of the spooky stories his friend had read aloud to him when they were just on the brink of their teens, on nights when Steve couldn’t sleep because he was simply too ill.

Bucky laughed. It wasn’t a pleasant laugh, and Steve knew, with a sensation like something barbed tearing at his heart, that the real Bucky had all but slipped away again—also that Loki, for some sudden reason, wasn’t there to stop the slippage anymore.

The antechamber door flew open, and Steve twisted, shield leaping into his hand, but it wasn’t a threat, only Natasha.

Only Natasha armed, and in uniform.

“Cap, you didn’t answer your phone. C’mon.”

Steve didn’t even know where his phone was at the moment. He avoided the thing as much as possible at the best of times. Still, he stood, shield in hand, trying to read her face, which, as always, proved nearly impossible.

“What’s up, anyway?”

“One god of thunder, that’s what’s up. I don’t know what pushed Thor over the edge, but the penthouse is on fire. We also have reports of brush-fires and exploding trees all over Central Park. Clint says Loki has his brother more or less corralled at the moment, but how long he’ll be able to hold him is anyone’s guess.

"Clint’s going to help clear the park, Pep and I will take care of evacuating the tower, and Kurt Wagner--you know, Loki's friend--has called in his X-Pals to help fight the fire itself. They have a lady who can make rain, maybe even help control the lightning. It seems with J.A.R.V.I.S. offline, Tony forgot to re-route the sprinklers. We need our heavy hitters to back Loki up, Cap. He isn’t going to last.”

“Natasha, I…” Steve glanced over his shoulder, at the sneering face of the Winter Soldier, grotesquely pressed against the barrier glass.

“Natasha, I can’t. I can’t just leave him.”

“The fire won’t reach here, Steve. Evacuating the civilians is only a precaution.”

“Could you leave Pepper?” Steve asked her. “Or Clint? Could you leave Clint?”

“ебать его, I don’t have time for this Cap. I don’t. Suit yourself. Do what you want.” She paused, just for an instant, in the doorway, her eyes full of a sorrow that seemed somehow uniquely Russian, like the Red Army POW's, who’d known that even if they survived the workcamps and returned home, it would be only to meet their own deaths, not the arms of their loved ones, that their own leader would consider them unclean, traitors, polluted by the west.

He'd known Natasha held great sorrow inside her, the sorrow of the Red Room and what it made of her. He'd just never understood how much sadness there really was.

“I’m sorry, Nat,” Steve said. “I am. I’d come if I could.”

“Me too, Steve,” Natasha answered. Then, “You know there’ll be a vote.”

“It’s okay,” Steve said. “Really, Natasha, I don’t mind. I just have to do my duty this time. My real duty.”

“May your god help you, then,” she said, and was gone.

Behind him, the Winter Soldier laughed long and loudly.

Steve wouldn’t let himself mute the sound.


	12. In Four Realms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the tower, Loki attempts to calm Thor's distress, but is quickly sidetracked by his own thoughts of Hodr's journal, as well as a flood of his own earlier memories. 
> 
> All the feels, all the time. And if you didn't hate Odin before...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> J.K Rowling is clearly a woman after my own heart: when a Dementor makes you feel really sad, eat lots of chocolate! Makes perfect sense to me.
> 
> The _Bhut jolokia_ , or ghost peppers, cultivated in Northern India, are the among the hottest of all peppers, measuring at 1 million Scoville Units, or 400 times hotter than Tabasco sauce. You can actually die from overindulging, which makes me wonder if one of Hela's sisters is the Death of Eating Overly Spicy Food.
> 
>  _föðurafi_ =grandfather (Icelandic)
> 
> The story of Loki cutting Sif's long, golden hair comes directly from Norse mythology. In the source material, Loki is forced to go to the Dwarves to obtain new hair for her (it's not clear why she doesn't just grow it out, like the rest of us), which the Dwarves forge from the essence of night (Mjolnir is also forged during the same encounter, along with other treasures). Of course, various trickery ensues, during which Loki ends up betting his head, something the Dwarves are more than ready to take when Loki loses the bet. Loki, however, outwits them by saying he'll gladly give up his head, but in taking it they can't touch his neck. Foiled and outraged, the Dwarves end up stitching Loki's mouth shut with iron thread instead.
> 
> Desserts sprinkled with 24-caret edible gold dust or gold flakes are actually a thing. 
> 
> Anyone who's ever been out on the English Channel in a small, open boat probably has a fair idea why Volstagg might call it the "Churning Sea." Dramamine recommended!
> 
> Glastonbury, home of the music festival and many, many Arthurian associations, is located in the county of Somerset (formerly called _Sumortūnsǣte_ , in the southwest of England. The name Glastonbury itself comes from the words " _glas torr_ ," which actually mean "sacred tree" (as does the Icelandic phrase " _Heilagt Tré_ "). The legend of Merlin imprisoned by Nimue (aka Vivian) in a crystal cave or huge crystal actually comes from a mistranslation of _glas torr_ as "crystal tower."
> 
>  _Rakastettu_ ="beloved" (Finnish)
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>  _eiginmaður_ (Icelandic) and _Aviomies_ (Finnish) are both words for "husband"

* * *

“Thor,” Loki said gently, laying his hand upon his brother’s shoulder, the flesh hard as cold steel from the unrelenting tightness of Thor’s muscles beneath the skin.

“Dearest Thor, hear me, I pray you. Do not allow these words to consume you, for such was never Hodr’s intent. He was your true brother ever, and would not have wished to cause you pain.”

From Thor’s throat came a low, inarticulate moan of utter anguish.

“Oh, Thor. Oh, brother.” Loki said, thinking he knew well what Thor felt, for not so many years past he, too, had known a similar pain, that of a world entirely broken asunder, nothing ever what he thought it had been, faces he loved revealed only to be masks covering over cesspits of bitter lies.

It was one thing, Loki was fully aware, to strike out on one’s own, to proclaim one’s independence, quite another to see each last pillar that supports one’s world knocked askew.

Thor kept the journal clamped within the circle of his powerful hands, (his father’s journal, Loki reminded himself, his own father’s, his very own, that book the only thing he possessed to remember unto himself that good man of the _Ӕsir_ , who had loved him from the moment of his birth, through the last word written in those pages, and then beyond) as if he would press bruises into its leathern covers, throttle life from its mute pages.

With the same gentleness, Loki attempted to prise the book from between his brother’s fingers, but could not. For all his work with the therapists Tony procured for him, all the hours spent playing upon his instruments, his own fingers remained too weak in these days to best his brother’s strength.

He could only think of Thor as his brother. To think of him as his uncle seemed faintly ludicrous, whatever the truth of their situation.

“I should not have given you these words to read, _hjarta minn_ ,” Loki said with regret. “Had I been wise, I should have taken them only to myself, to be pondered at length, and then relayed unto you after.”

“Am I a child, to be coddled and protected?” Thor asked, not sounding angry in the least, only brutally weary, terribly sad and confused. Thor's face, ordinarily so bright-eyed and handsome, the face of the bravest of heroes, was not made for such emotions.

“Perhaps, at times, we all are so,” Loki answered.

He stroked the backs of his fingers softly over Thor’s cheek, feeling the muscles of his brother’s jaw twitch and jump beneath his touch.

“How often, in these days, dearest brother, have you spoken for me, protected me? I am not a child, Thor, yet still I value the care you show for me always.”

“You are my little brother,” Thor responded.

They both froze, blue eyes fixed upon violet eyes.

“No,” Thor said at last. “Not my brother. You are my nephew, and I your uncle. My lawful nephew. Loki Hodrson. They wed. Your father made that clear by his words, and also by the pages folded within this volume.”

At last, he released the journal, setting it with extreme care upon the table-of-refreshment, as if it had been an egg of steel, of the sort Tony called a “grenade,” that might explode upon the moment.

“They wed, by rites of _Ӕsir_ and of _Jötnar_. Never were you born on the wrong side of _Jötunn_ sheets. You are Loki, son of Hodr, son of Odin, son of Bors, and so back through time and to the void, the shaping of the Nine Realms from the giant Ymir’s corpse.”

“Thor,” Loki said, trying to make his voice light, when he truly wanted to weep. “I think not that the universe was actually formed from a giant’s corpse. Truly would he have needed to be a _fjandinn_ mighty giant, were that the case.”

“It matters not,” answered Thor, with some stubbornness. “In the Realm of Legend, which bears its own truths, it is so.”

Loki considered that a fair enough answer.

“Thor,” he said, “In the books of the most-wise Ms. Rowling, who is in truth the loveliest of ladies, is it not stated that chocolate is most efficacious for the states of sadness or troubled thought?”

Loki took his brother’s now-emptied hands into his own, smoothing his thumbs across the battered knuckles in soft strokes. It was a fact of Thor, that he might often be brought back from the greatest of rages by the smallest of things—a loving touch, a taste of something delicious to eat. Tony called Thor a chocoholic, but it was not a terrible or destructive thing, as was his husband’s imbibing of strong drink. It brought Thor happiness, and Loki often sought sweets for him in amusing shapes or divers flavours, some quite pleasant, some not.

To their mutual great distress they had discovered ghost peppers were not, in fact, weak and nebulous vegetables, that chocolate infused with their wicked essence was ever to be avoided.

Tony had laughed heartily at their distress, and then fetched them tall glasses of milk (goat’s milk for Loki) to ease the burning that seemed to consume them from the inside out.

“Thor," Loki said softly, still holding his brother's hands. "Shall we not heed Ms. Rowling’s well-reasoned words, and enjoy a morsel or two for the sake of our better spirits? There is a box of the very finest here, which Tony gave to me at Christmas, and in my sickness-of-morning, I have not yet assayed to partake of it. However, at this hour, the thought of these chocolates seems to me most delicious.”

“Such feelings are called cravings,” Thor returned, knowledgeably, though his voice remained shaken, with a duller tone than was its wont.

Hope filled Loki that his brother might yet emerge from this wounding of the soul unscathed, though minute lightnings crackled still at the tips of his fingers. The air smelled also, of that odor Tony called “ozone,” like that the sky holds directly before the breaking of a storm.

“My dearest Lady Jane, though she feels no sickness-of-morning whatsoever, experiences these cravings most mightily,” Thor continued, his tone now thick with unshed tears, “And oft-times arouses me in the night to prepare for her meals which, I must confess, run quite contrary to my culinary training, as well as disgusting me greatly--though I might well wish you shared of her appetite, my poor Loki.”

“I will yet prosper, Thor,” Loki soothed. “You shall see.”

He rose, attempting to look neither weak nor shaken, to retrieve the shining black box of chocolates from a shelf. Removing the lid, he set the box across Thor’s knees. He felt no real desire for what lay within, only to bear Thor back from this precipice of emotion so strong that, unchecked, it might destroy them both.

If only someone had done the same for him, when he discovered that first hidden piece in the crooked puzzle of his own heritage, then might his feet not have been set upon the dangerous paths that led him unto the worst of terrible ways.

If only someone had thought, in that time, to comfort him, to hold him in loving arms, to say unto to him, “Loki, you are loved by us just as you always were, no monster ever, but our much loved brother/comrade/son."

But there had been no caring arms for him, only his so-called father’s cold disdain.

For this, the Realms had been shaken to their foundations, lives lost, and though perhaps the least of those lost was his own, Loki missed, at times, his strength of body, and the confident life he had known.

Winded from his brief journey across the common area, and slightly faint, he leaned then upon Thor’s powerful shoulder to rest.

Thor studied the sweets, which were pretty and cunningly crafted, sprinkled with divers substances, though none which Loki might not eat.

“Why do these gleam?” Thor pointed with one thick finger.

“Such is my husband’s excess, they are sprinkled with powder of purest gold. I believe we ought to bring some along with us, if ever we go again to trade with the Dwarvenkind. Perhaps such tempting bon bons might sweeten their tempers.”

As always, Loki’s lips, his entire mouth, burned when he thought of the Dwarves, far worse than ever the burning of the ghost peppers had been.

As a people, the Dwarvenkind were oft half-mad and forever cruel, gluttons for gold and precious things, and possessed no appreciation for mischief in any form. Mischief he would surely practice gladly enough, upon such curmudgeonly creatures, but it would never have been in his heart to cheat them. Aside from the dishonesty and dishonor of the act, Loki had been no fool. In addition to their great stature, the Dwarvenkind were strong from their constant beatings upon the anvils, possessed tempers hotter than any forge-flame, and came armed with a cold-iron magic over which Loki’s _seiðr_ could at some times hold little dominion, in those days when he was still quite young.

Well it was known, also, that the Dwarves knew honour only toward their own kind, and many harsh implements were theirs to command, against those who invoked their ire.

Never would Loki have crossed them, left to his own devices, or even have entered the dark of their caverns. He had known enough of caverns to last his lifetime, should he live out twice Odin’s days. But where the King of Asgard commanded, he had gone, far more fearful of his father than of the Sons of Earth.

Loki rubbed his lips tenderly with the tips of his fingers. It had all been so long ago, so very long ago. Clearly, no physical pain could linger still. Only memory.

Nothing, Loki often thought, could be more painful.

Stumbling into the Golden Hall of the citadel, stripped half-bare, blood bubbling (with the iron in his flesh, most cruelly and strongly bespelled, he could not heal, nor, somehow, could he rip the stitches from his mouth with his trembling fingers), his father’s (no, no, the father-of-his-father, he now knew, his _föðurafi,_ the own, true grandfather of his blood) booming laughter echoed in his ears and, after a mere moment, the following laughter (cruel or forced or uneasy) of each and every noble in the hall.

Loki believed he heard Heimdall laughing all the way from the Bifrost, as he wept, and bled, and nearly caught fire with the heat of his own shame.

“A prince of the _Ӕsir_ , Loki, bested by Dwarvenkind?” Odin guffawed. “Witness, my people! May the _Nornir_ send them blessings, truly, that they have, at last, for a time, stilled Loki’s foolish, insolent, prattling tongue. One would imagine a boy so _ergi_ as himself would not lack the skill to pick out a few stitches, and yet he stands before us in such an attitude, polluting this fair hall with his blood.”

More laughter then, more hard words spoken. Loki forced himself to straighten, to glare at them all with an attitude of bored distain, even as the great hall spun and swooped in his giddy vision, until Sif, the one he was said to have wronged, and Volstagg, her Shield-Brother and Thor’s, bore him away to his own bedchamber.

Loki had not harmed her, he tried to swear it, though the words he would speak were a mere, pained, wordless mumbling. Yes, he had been jealous, that was true, for he was young and missed his brother, feeling nearly sick, at times, of the position of worth, the importance, Sif had taken in Thor’s life.

That thing of which he stood accused, however, would never have been his work. To cut Sif’s long golden hair with workaday shears was too unimaginative, too banal, for such as he, as any fool might have easily seen.

Would Loki Odinson, sorcerer, silvertongue, god of mischief of many kinds, be such a dullard as to simply snip away a Shield-Maiden’s locks, like some mundane barber in the marketplace?

Had it truly been Loki's work, he would have bespelled Sif’s locks to change in their color and form at divers and unexpected times, to be green and drawn up to a point above her head like an evergreen tree on one day, to become an explosion of violet petals, beset by birds, the next, to reshape themselves into a nest of serpents as Sif sat at her breakfast, only to resolve into a goat’s long and curving horns as she toiled on the practice fields.

Had it been his work, the mischief would have been mad, full of invention, and amusing, and for once the others might have laughed at Mighty Sif, instead of at him.

Though Loki knew, in his heart, that would never have been. They would always laugh at him.

Volstagg chose, at random, one of Loki’s chairs, carrying it with one hand out to the balcony, where fresh snow piled itself upon the railings. Sif pushed Loki from behind, by small increments, impatient but not, this time, unkind, until he half-fell into the seat the huge warrior had placed ready.

Loki breathed of the sweet cold air, shallowly, through his nose, until at last he felt somewhat restored, the sickness and lassitude of the forges' unrelieved heat, impossible for him to bear, draining slowly from his flesh.

Sif gave his shoulder a hard, though not a brutal, smack. Loki’s eyes met hers, astonished to see no anger there, and no disgust.

“I know you did not commit this act,” she said at last, brusquely. “Loki, I know. You would have done something surpassing strange, yet clever. Something that shouted ‘Loki!’ from the rooftops. And after all, it’s only hair. I might have cut it myself, one day.”

Sif looked as if she meant to say more, but then did not. She only left him alone with Volstagg.

Loki rose, took a double handful of snow from the railings, and sat again, holding his snow-filled hands against his tortured mouth. There was some relief. A little.

“Your mother the queen will not heal you,” Volstagg rumbled. “The Allfather says it will not be allowed.”

Loki nodded. Volstagg's words held no surprise. He had known.

The warrior leaned his heavy body back against the closed doors, broad face turned upward toward the firmament, flecks of snow melting within his fiery beard.

“I love the landing of snowflakes upon my skin,” he said, “Always have done, since I was a youngling. Not in Jötunnheimr, mind. There, the cold’s bitter. It’ll freeze your cock to an icicle, and your man-stones to snowballs, and that’s the _Nornir's_  truth, m'boy. When your brother Hodr was sent there as ambassador, and lived amongst the Frosties for a time, and I with him as his guard and gentleman-of-service, they built for him a special chamber in the city, only to be warm in.

"They are not the monsters we’re told they are, you know," Volstagg went on, after a pause. "The _Jötnar_ , that is. Before the Casket of Ancient Winters was taken from them, they were a proud and strong people, mighty sorcerers, makers of music and beautiful things. Though I lose my head for the words I speak now, it was a cruel thing your father did, Loki.”

Loki glanced up, quite unsure if the warrior meant Odin’s cruelty against the _Jötnar_ , or against himself. To his profound and continuing shame, he felt his eyes well with tears.

“You poor child,” Volstagg murmured, in a voice so low even sharp-eared Loki could scarcely hear, quite, quite unlike his usual thunderous tones.

“You poor, poor sad boy, what will ever become of you? You would think our king might grow tired of this terrible game, and leave you in some peace.”

His vast hand cupped the back of Loki’s head, and only for a few moments Loki allowed his brow to rest against the warrior’s muscular yet well-padded hip, if only to pretend, for that short time, that some kindness was felt for him, somewhere in Asgard.

When Volstagg spoke again, his voice was as the merest murmur of a summer wind. “You are able to make your way to Midgard, Loki, I hear. Without benefit of the Rainbow Bridge, or anyone the wiser?”

Once more, Loki nodded.

“Go then, when you can, but not to the Land of the Northmen, as you are accustomed. Cross the Churning Sea to the Island of the Britons, and thence to the south-west corner of that land, that place called by its people _Sumortūnsǣte_. There upon a low, round hill you will find the _Heilagt Tré_ , or as its people name it, the _Glas Torr_ , the Sacred Tree. A mighty enchanter you’ll find imprisoned within, and as you free him, lad, so in turn will he free you.”

Volstagg’s hand moved from Loki’s head to his shoulder, the warrior looking down upon him from his great height, with rather the look of a kindly uncle possessed of an impossible nephew.

“As you’ll recall, Loki, I said nothing. We scarcely spoke.”

Loki gestured toward his tortured mouth, stitched tighter-than-tight with those thin-yet-unbreakable cables of cold iron.

“True enough, my boy.” Volstagg clapped his shoulder, so powerful a blow pain seared through Loki’s entire skull. “True enough.”

The warrior ambled away as if he had not a care in all of Asgard.

Loki had traveled into the west, as Volstagg said.

He found the ancient tree on its small, round hill like a peasant’s cap, and in the heart of the tree found Myrddin sleeping, dreaming, as always, of impossible things. Myrddin who was old then, even ancient, though he grew younger with each passing day.

Loki knew a kindred spirit when he saw one.

For a time, he was healed, and even happy.

 

Loki had meant to be careful of Thor’s feelings, to let nothing spill from him, yet he was weak by his own reckoning, himself still shaken by what he had read. Once the wave of memory caught him, Loki found himself swept deep into its dark, eternal sea. He wished in his heart he could remember his father’s face--not the stiff, stylized Hodr of the official portraits, or the blurred and incomplete image preserved in his brother's mind, as Thor had been still been very young when Hodr left them.

The moments caught in the net of Thor’s remembrance were not so much things of focused sight as they were of other senses: the sound of Hodr’s voice as he taught Thor so patiently to feed what he called "his baby," the kindly weight of his brother’s arm around Thor’s shoulders, the warmth of lamplight as Hodr read by night in the library.

From Hodr, Loki’s thought strayed to the one his father loved, the one Odin called a monster and a brute, of a race all of the _Ӕsir_ —yes, even himself, himself worst of all, to his terrible shame--had regarded as far less than they.

His _Pabbi_. His own _Pabbi_ , Laufey had been. He was truly Loki Laufeyson as much as Loki Hodrson. He had been lied to, misled, mistaken about everything.

Even so he was the monster, for his acts--both attempted and achieved--had been monstrous. And selfish.

The _Jötnar_ had suffered enough, and yet, mad with betrayal and inner pain, he had tried to slay them all. If Laufey had been harsh, if he had been angry and bitter, when they met in later years, why then would he not be? Had he not lost everything, and seen all he called his own stolen from his hands?

Laufey had never hated him. Loki had never been abandoned on some frozen rock because he was weak and small, as Odin lied.

He was small because even as the battle raged on, Laufey carried him within. Indomitable, the king fought, and made his magic, led his people, brought into life his little son.

There was no food left for them. Wherever the _Ӕsir_ came, they came with fire, poison, blood, tainting the ponds and seas until the fish in shoals washed up bloated and dead upon the shores, slaughtering the vast herds of creatures, much like reindeer, that once roamed the plains, unlike reindeer, gentle and trusting as little children.

In the final War of Jötunheimr, more than 80,000 _Jötnar_ warriors fell, fighting to protect the Casket of Ancient Winters from the remorseless _Ӕsir_ hordes, who fought as Berserkers, without mercy or restraint, until the Casket was lost, and with it went their strength, their last hopes of bringing healing to their harsh but beautiful land.

They could only retreat before Odin’s might. Laufey gathered the sad remnants of his forces, fighting in the rearguard himself, with the strongest of his warriors, as the rest fled for higher land, in hopes the mazes of jagged peaks and depthless crannies might at least slow the enemy by some small measure.

It was during this last push that Laufey felt the birth-pains come hard upon him, and knew he must halt. Neither he, nor his warriors--even the strongest on the brink of exhaustion--could travel further that night. In the indifferent shelter of a ruin, that had once been a soaring temple of stone and ice, Laufey crouched as the child came, surrounded by his people who loved him, and would fight for him until the last.

He crouched, and in the extremity of his pain cried out across the barriers of the Realms, to the enemy who was never his enemy, his espoused, his belovéd who he loved above the moon and stars, _Rakastettu,_ Hodr _rakastettu, he comes apace. What shall I do? How shall I save him, our most-precious little one, with our Realm in ruins, and no milk in me to feed him, even my ice spent?_

Against all hope, his much-loved husband answered him. _Be at peace, Laufey_ eiginmaður, _I will come._

 _You are forbidden_ , Laufey answered, _By your king’s decree. And no place of warmth remains now for you to dwell in._

 _Yet will I come,_ Hodr answered, _For you are dear to me above the great, turning sea, and even above the sun that lights my world._

As Laufey’s body shivered, and spasmed, and he pushed his child out into the night’s dark, and into the cold of the world, into the hands of the most trusted of his many trusted warriors, Hodr remained with him, and held him, surrounding him in the beautiful clear cool tenderness of his love, until he and Laufey might look together at the boy they had made, the lovely small child with the graceful lines of Laufey’s family markings upon his face, and a soft black fluff upon his head, the precursor, Laufey suspected, of Hodr’s mad black curls, surrounding the tiny hard bumps that would someday become the horns of their little one.

The youngling blinked at them with great, solemn, crimson eyes, as if he knew and loved them both in that instant, and noticed everything, great and small, in all the world.

 _Our love made flesh,_ eiginmaður, Hodr said. _What do you name him, Laufey?_

 _I name him Loki,_ Laufey answered, _After the great hero of our people._

 _A fine name,_ Hodr said. _Do you hear, Loki? Today is your Naming Day, and you were made in great love, my son, for although we are different in our flesh, and Realms apart, ever are we one._

 _Come for him swiftly_ , aviomies, Laufey said, _For I sense the approach of your father in his vicious wrath. Make peace for our peoples if you can. Let Loki know I hold him always in my heart, if not my arms. I need not tell you to raise him well, Hodr, for I know you, and know you will._

Still lost in memory, caught up in the twists of an ignorance he had not been able to help, (much like another prince, called Oedipus), the Loki of Stark Tower, Tony’s husband, cried out in silent anguish: _oh I killed him oh I killed him oh gods oh gods oh_ Nornir _judge me not I killed him..._

Laufey held the child to his heart, then kissed each of his little hands, and his brow, calling him many sweet names, then delivered him unto the chief of his warriors, to be placed, as safe as possible, on a little shelf of stone in a secluded corner, where the cruelty of battle would, with fortune, not roll over him.

The warriors of Laufey surrounded their king, who remained weak in that time from deprivation, loss of blood, most of all from the birth of his son, though he strengthened moment by moment.

The troops of Odin Allfather seemed to fill the mountains. The ice shivered with their careless voices, with the clash of their weapons.

 _Hodr, husband, come now, come now_ , Laufey prayed. _For our small Loki, come now!_

But Hodr did not come, though never would he have failed his husband, had the journey been possible.

Small Loki was lost, murdered, no doubt, by the barbarian, Odin Borsson.

And from that day Laufey _Kunigas_ became a prisoner without fetters, locked within the cage of his own dying realm.

Hodr spread his hands flat upon his writing table to steady them. He felt drained, shaken, and his nose bled heavily, such Craft as he possessed (which was nothing to his mother’s, except in matters of traveling), stretched nearly to the breaking. He knew, however, he must prepare, and swiftly.

The fabric between the Realms must be parted. He must slip through, and rescue his son.

When he looked up, his mother, Frigga, stood over his table, the red cords of her _seiðr_ whipping around her, as if stirred by a violent wind.

“What you plan is madness, my son,” she chided him. “Do you imagine for one beating of your heart that your father will not know? Do you imagine your life is not already forfeit for this thing you have done, which he forbade to you so vehemently? What do you suppose would become of such a child? A little blue _Jötunn_ in Asgard, where the _Jötnar_ are so reviled? Hodr, my clever yet foolish dreamer, be sensible for once.”

“I thought to work a Glamour upon him,” Hodr said, “And hide him amongst your people, the Vanir, until...”

 _Until I, myself, am king?_ Hodr did not wish to be king of Asgard. He never had.

“You shall do no such thing!” his mother snapped.

A cord of her _seiðr_ lashed out, striking Hodr full across the eyes. In that instant he fell forward, his head hitting the table, unable to move, his thoughts clouded and confused. He lay with his cheek upon his documents, watching the thin red thread of his blood unspool across the parchment, unable to so much as shed tears for the son he had loved so deeply, though so briefly, and then so quickly lost.

What terrible acts would his father perform against his sweet innocent, the child Hodr had been forbidden to give life, from a marriage never to be mentioned? His youngling, his little one, his Loki, conceived in greatest love.

 

“Hodr,” his father said to him, the day before Hodr's death, “I never comprehend why you judge me so harshly. Everything I do is for Loki’s sake. How would it benefit him to be seen for what he is? How is it you cannot see the truth in what I tell you?”

They walked together, father and son, in Frigga’s garden, where all the flowers bloomed in this season, and the air was alive with bees.

Now and then, Hodr detected a giggle or a muffled shout. The little boys played _Hide Me-Seek You_ round and about the plantings, and poor Thor seemed to have no idea how his ungainly size and the glint of the sun off his bright hair rendered him almost ridiculously easy to spot, while Loki disappeared again and again as if banished from existence.

Thor, at last, became peeved beyond bearing.

“Loki!” he shouted. “You make it too hard. Hide where I can discover you, or I shall quickly go to play with Fandral and Sif instead!”

Loki popped into being almost directly at Thor’s feet, and Hodr glanced swiftly at his father.

“ _Nornir_ , he is using pocket universes! How old is the boy?”

Odin’s single eye glinted with malice disguised as amusement. “Five now. Loki is five.”

The words, _As you well know,_ remained unsaid.

“And what does my honored mother say? Does she train him?”

“There is a course of study,” Odin replied blandly, which meant the boy would not learn a quarter of that of which he was capable.

The Allfather called out suddenly, sharply, “Loki! To me!”

 _My son is not your hound, old man_ , Hodr thought, though he spoke no words aloud.

“He cheated, Father!” Thor cried out, all indignance, glaring at the younger boy. “Loki used magic, and magic is _ergi_! A true warrior would never use magic.”

“I use magic, from time to time,” Hodr said mildly. “As does our father. In truth, our father often uses magic. His familiars, Huginn and Muninn, are constructs of such. And a warrior, sweet Thor, would not tattle upon a Shield-Brother. You are strong in your way, youngling, and Loki is strong in his. It hurts you not to lose at a game, now and then, to such a small boy, when you so often win at other pursuits. A king, though he be mighty, is just, never petty in his ways. He cultivates, always, generosity of spirit, for such things make him a great king, and not a tyrant.”

Thor’s blue eyes grew wide. He nodded solemnly. “It is as you say, my brother. Forgive me, dear Loki, that I was cross with your winning. You were quite clever, really, and I became jealous.”

He made as if to take the smaller boy’s hand, but the Allfather smacked the two reaching hands apart.

“You may go to play as you will, Thor, but Loki must be punished for his deceit. He lags sadly behind in the use of even the light practice sword, and who better to train him than his own mighty brother. Fetch your sword, boy, and go to Baldr. Be certain to thank him sincerely that he deigns to instruct you. At the setting of the sun you may cease and come to supper.”

“That is nearly four hours, Father,” Hodr said. “Baldr is a difficult taskmaster, and the boy is very young.”

They maintained, always, even between themselves, the fiction that Loki was Odin’s son, not his own.

“Loki is shamefully weak for his age,” the Allfather answered.

He was very thin, also, Hodr saw. They took no pains to feed him well, in ways that suited his unique body. Rumour said the child was often ill.

“Already have I one son who is _ergi_ and useless. Would you gift me with another? Would that Baldr had been my firstborn, for he sees as I see.”

 _Ah, cruelly and selfishly, as well as half-blind?_ Hodr thought, _Yes, my brother does, truly, see as you see, Father._

Yet he said nothing, beyond, “Allow me then to escort Loki to my brother’s abode, for I would watch the swordplay. Perhaps I, too, might benefit from Baldr’s instruction, weak and _ergi_ though I may be.”

Odin made a sound of disgust, an ugly, angry, animal noise, but Hodr merely took Loki’s hand and walked away.

In the end he did not convey Loki to Baldr, but to a certain calm lake, and going out onto the water in a small boat, he took Loki into his lap and taught him to handle the oars, singing to him old songs half-forgotten by the _Ӕsir,_ and songs of the _Jötnar_ that Laufey and his people had sung for him, in that brief, happy time when they were one.

When Loki grew weary, and a little dazzled by the sun, Hodr merely held him, shading the boy's eyes from the brightness with his hand. He told him stories of the great blue people of the Frostlands, and of their king, who loved his folk so bravely and truly.

“Will I ever travel to the Frostlands?” Loki asked.

In his _Ӕsir_ form, his eyes were as green as Hodr’s own, his hair dark as the inside of a cave. The little boy’s attendants had instructions to flatten his curls each morning, for reasons Hodr could not understand. He saw Laufey in every line of the child’s countenance, and knew that resemblance would only increase with time, his husband’s features gentled and refined, yet ever-present in the face of his son.

“You have traveled there, Loki,” Hodr answered, “Though you were very young at that time, and remember the journey not.”

Loki lay against his shoulder and pondered such a thing—that there was a part of his life he might never own for himself.

Hodr kissed the top of his soft hair and lifted Loki’s hands in his own, studying Loki’s fair, fair skin, so much paler than his own, the fingers so long and slender for a child’s. As Loki began to drowse, ever-cool against the warmth of his own body, Hodr dozed lightly as well, slipping into a dream of a universe in which there were no Allfathers or wars, and he and Laufey raised their child together in contentment and love, far, far from Odin’s harm.

"Your thoughts perplex me,” Loki said, as Hodr jerked back to awareness, “Yet, still, it comes into my mind, my brother, that I wish you were my father, and not the king.”

“I could imagine no finer son,” Hodr answered, stroking back the little boy’s soft hair.

What would Loki look like in his _Jötunn_ form, he wondered. Had his small horns come in? Had his familial markings remained, exactly, Laufey’s?

“Such thoughts are indeed, very strange,” Loki said, turning his face toward the sky. “The ravens come, brother, to watch. We will be punished, I fear, you and I.”

“I wish that I could spare you all such sufferings, Loki.”

“How can we wish for that which may never be?” Loki replied, in a tone so weary and ancient he might have known five thousand years instead of five, a tone Hodr had often heard before, in Laufey’s voice.

He settled Loki again between his knees, and together they rowed slowly for the shore, both wishing with all their hearts for an afternoon that might go and on, never ending, the two of them together.

Thor came running down to them as they climbed the steps to the citadel.

“Where had you gone to?” he blurted. “You are very much in trouble and will be punished, father says. Why did you not obey him?”

Loki straightened his spine and squared his shoulders, a mask of pure, frozen princely arrogance dropping over his once-mobile face.

Would that face, that mask, be ever his defense? It saddened Hodr to think so.

“Brother, I do what I want,” Loki answered, in haughty tones.


	13. Burning Down the House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hela ponders several things as she strolls the Rainbow Bridge toward Jotunnheimr. Thor's loss of control, though understandable, has dire consequences. Tony wakes up still in Chicago and wishes Happy hadn't turned on the news.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title, " _Burning Down the House_ ," comes from the 1983 Talking Heads song of the same name, from their album, _Speaking in Tongues_.
> 
> The acronym "Roy G. Biv" stands for the sequence of colors that our human vision perceives as making up a rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. Hela, clearly, can see the actual continuous spectrum of colors, while the rest of us only see the distinct bands.
> 
> The word "gumption" is of Scottish origin. It was first recorded around 1719, with the meanings of "common sense" or "shrewdness," by 1812 it had taken on the additional sense of "initiative."
> 
> An Otter Pop (called a "Cool Pop" when I was young) is a foot-long plastic tube filled with sweet, brightly-colored fluid. When frozen, they make a Popsicle (Ice Lolly?), of sorts.
> 
> Hela's lyrics come from The Rolling Stones song, " _You Can't Always Get What You Want_ ," from their 1969 album, _Let It Bleed_. 
> 
> Joss Whedon's sublime SpaceWestern, _Firefly_ , starring Nathan Fillion as Mal Reynolds, captain of the spaceship _Serenity_ , sadly only lasted for one season, 2002-2003.
> 
> A tricorne is a three-pointed hat of the kind associated with pirates and Founding Fathers.
> 
> One of Shakespeare's best-known lines, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy" comes from Act 1, scene 5 of _Hamlet_.
> 
>  _Unsere geliebte Dame, rette uns_ =(roughly) Our Dear Lady save us!
> 
> "skedaddle"=hurry, run away  
> The word, likely a variation of the British dialect word "scaddle," meaning “to run away in fright” first appeared in the U.S. sometime in the 19th century.
> 
> "Schlub," (from the Yiddish word _zhlob_ means a person who's socially awkward, unattractive, clumsy, or oafish, though Tony's using it more in the sense of "just a regular, ordinary guy."
> 
> The Gobi Desert covers parts of northern and northwestern China, and of southern Mongolia.
> 
> A Roman collar (aka a priest collar, clerical collar or clergy collar) closes at the back and shows a little tab of a contrasting color (commonly white with a black shirt, though not always) front and center.
> 
> A grand mal seizure (aka generalized tonic-clonic seizure) is caused by abnormal electrical activity throughout the brain, resulting in unconsciousness and extreme muscle contractions.
> 
> The tempo of the Bee Gees disco classic " _Stayin' Alive_ " (from the 1977 _Saturday Night Fever_ soundtrack) actually happens to have the exact rhythm that needs to be maintained when performing heart compressions.

* * *

“Hmn,” Hela said, as she followed the rainbow road with her Sisters by either side. “That encounter was surprising. Actually… is 'disappointing' not, in fact, the best description? I expected the Watchman to be…” She circled one delicately lace-gloved hand in the air, searching for the precise word she wanted to convey her thoughts. Her fingertips tingled, and her eyesight seemed sharp, sharper than ever before.

Hela supposed, when she thought of it, the change wasn’t altogether surprising. Her dad had taught her an acronym for the colors of the rainbow--Roy G. Biv--and yet the hues she saw stretched before her were so much more numerous than the seven simple shades he’d listed. A mortal mind could not have contained them, but Hela’s could.

Hela’s mind could contain them easily.

“Evil?” suggested The Violent Death of Gods. She seemed put out, even miffed.

Hela suspected she’d quite looked forward to removing her elegant, above-the-elbow gloves (they closed with cunning small buttons of jet at the wrists, three of them, carved to the shape of minute skulls, and Hela found them very fetching indeed, though she supposed this was no time to be taking note of fashion details) the better to convey the guardian of the Bifrost, Heimdall, to his oh-so-just reward.

“He hadn’t…” Hela thought of an amusing word used by Mrs. Ransome from time to time. “The _gumption_ to be evil.”

Her brain always supplied the image of “gumption” as a sort of thick, spicy soup, like a gumbo, with slices of sausage in it, that one partook of for greater courage.

“He was only…”

“A worthless, spineless toady of the goddamned Allfather, who well deserved to remain a living Popsicle, as your esteemed _Pabbi_ left him?” put in The Death of Kings cheerfully.

“’Popsicle?’” said the Grandmother sternly, looking at The Death of Kings askance.

“What?” The Death of Kings responded. “Even the kings of Midgard live short lives. I spend a lot of time in the Realm. I like Popsicles. They’re refreshing! Grandmother, I believe you’re in a temper because you wanted to take him, and found he wasn’t worth your time.”

The Grandmother sighed. “Even the gods lack quality in these days. Not your _Pabbi_ or your uncle, of course, dear,” she added to Hela. “They are lovely gentlemen, and I mean no offense.”

“None taken, Wise Grandmother,” Hela responded politely.

Hela had left Heimdall lying, mortal, weak and befuddled, upon the floor of his domed chamber, his eyes dull-brown instead of golden, his armour rusted, palsied hands clutching his now-useless broadsword to his chest beside the mechanism he’d commonly used to extend the Bifrost, a mechanism the Deaths needed less than cats need lessons in aloofness.

Last of all she pressed a fingers to his lips. _Ssh. Ssh. Watchman, tell no tales to your master._

Heimdall wept then, yet Hela knew he wouldn't do what she forbade him. He would not speak. Ever again. For whatever sad tatters remained of his days.

She supposed she ought to be sorry, but she wasn't. How many times had he betrayed her _Pabbi_? The hour had come round at last for his wagging tongue to lie still within his head.

No, Hela was not sorry. Not in the least. She’d drunk the magic and might right out of the Watchman (if one was to speak of Popsicles) in much the same way she, or her brothers, or her dad, might have slurped the last over-sweet, garishly-coloured juice from the bottom of an Otter Pop packet.

They all loved Otter Pops, as did Uncle Thor.

 _Pabbi_ found them revolting, and would constantly change their animal name as he huffed, “Belovéd family, I pray, suck not so noisily upon your _fjandinn_ Badger Pops within my hearing!”

Which of course only made them slurp all the more madly, with wild giggles.

Hela missed them so terribly, her family. So _terribly_ terribly. Even in this moment, ancient-hearted, implacable, and a-tingle with Heimdall’s godly might, how was she meant to bear the separation? What would the possession even of the Nine Realms be, without _Pabbi_ and Dad and the boys?

She would have to bear it, Hela knew. As Mick Jagger would say, “ _You can’t always get what you want_.”

The Death of Kings patted warmly, if somewhat clumsily, between Hela’s shoulder-blades.

“It’s all right, sweetie,” she said. "You're such a new Death. It’s only homesickness. You get used to it.”

Hela did not much _want_ to get used to it.

 _“If you try sometimes well you just might find/You get what you need…_ ” Mick would also say, which was equally true, though very likely Mr. Jagger had not been thinking of the downfall of an ancient and corrupt god when he penned the words.

Mick Jagger had also sung the lines, “ _She was practiced at the art of deception… I could tell by her blood-stained hands_.”

Hela knew those few simple words to be quite true of her, perhaps more so than any other words that could be spoken. If her _Pabbi_ was a consummate actor, she, even at her young age, could not be bettered as a liar and deceiver. She watched, she chose her path, and she let her enemies (whether the Stark Academy teacher who’d set out to shame sweet Fen before others, or her vicious-hearted grandfather) tumble gracefully into the elegant traps she set.

And her hands _would_ be blood-stained, she knew—not because of her calling, which to Hela was necessary, kind, even sacred—but because whatever fate she appointed for Odin would very much _not_ be kind.

Nor should it, with the crimes he'd committed, the lives he’d destroyed.

It would not be a disused lavatory, dull mush, and uninteresting books to read, when _she_ was through with Odin. Much as she loved her _Pabbi,_ and admired him, they were not always the same in certain attributes, especially in this one thing. She was not damaged in any way. She was not hurt. And she would not stop at mischief when called upon to be cruel.

Hela thought of the girlish, colourful frocks she wore in Asgard, the ones the “Easter Bunny threw up on,” as her dad most certainly would have said. She thought also of marathon-watching DVDs of the television programme _Firefly_ with Tony, in the days she still called him “Uncle.”

“I swear by my pretty floral bonnet, I will end you,” the captain of _Serenity_ , the Firefly-Class spaceship, had said in one episode.

Hela swore much the same. By her pretty floral dresses, by her stern _Jötnar_ heart, by her strength and her truth and her unshakeable need for vengeance against the one who had hurt her kind grandfather, Hodr, and her dear Uncle Thor, and her sometimes blind, sometimes arrogant, yet still-not-deserving-of-all-Odin-had-done-to-enslave-them people, the _Ӕsir_.

Above all for her sweet, ruined, more-than-beloved _Pabbi_ , she would end the one whose wicked machinations meant he was her grandfather and great-grandfather both.

She would END him.

There was no question.

The Deaths walked on, the many-coloured lights of the Bifrost rippling smoothly across their white faces, adding mysterious shades to their inky clothing.

The Death of Kings removed her tricorne hat and long wig, ruffling her short-cropped hair.

“How much further do we go?” she asked.

“Not far,” Hela answered. “Do you feel the chill now in the air, Sister?”

She herself felt it clearly, not only the invigorating cold, but an experience of strange nostalgia, a sorrow and joy and familiarity mingled, as if she’d walked suddenly into a house she’d grown up in as a child, yet had not set foot inside for many years.

It struck her as a Dickensian sort of feeling, complicated and a bit old-fashioned.

It made her eyes well, and it made her want to bury her face into her _Pabbi’s_ chest, into one of his cloud-soft jumpers, with his thin, strong arms about her, and hear his much-loved voice speak to her quietly of the sorts of things _Pabbi_ spoke of always, the sorts of things, of all the family, only he and she truly understood.

Steeling her courage, Hela raised her small hands to push aside the curtain that separated world from world. Deaths did not travel the Rainbow Road in the way of gods and mortals. For them, the Bifrost was _a_ pathway, not the _only_ pathway. Their approach was not a multicoloured, tempest-tossed rush through the air, but stately, serene, for they approached a most-solemn ceremony, the parting of life from death.

Sometimes Hela wanted to shake her head when she heard Auntie Jane talk of Einstein-Rosen Bridges.

 _Oh, Auntie J_ , she wanted to tell her, _If you only knew the truth. If you only knew how much **more** than that it is…_

" _There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy_ ,” Prince Hamlet of Denmark had told his dearest friend. For philosophy, read science.

Hela knew better than to burst Auntie Jane’s bubble, or rain on her parade. Like her dad, Jane did very well, really, for a Midgardian, and like Fen, she must be encouraged and left to learn at her own pace. There was science, and there was the _vita alger_ , the knowing absolute, that small, quirked part within the brains of beings such as her _Pabbi_ and herself, a twist somewhere between genius and the instincts of animals, which mortals like dad and Auntie Jane, brilliant as they were, could never hold inside their heads.

“Do you ever think to tell her?” Hela once asked Uncle Thor.

Her uncle had blinked his bright blue eyes, gazing down thoughtfully upon her face. “How can I?” he answered simply. “I am not so cruel, _hjarta minn_. I should break her heart.”

Hela took one long step forward, shut her eyes, and stood amongst the ice-glittered peaks of Jötunnheimr.

“' _There’s no place like home',_ click-click,” she murmured.

“What is that, my dearest?” the Grandmother asked.

“We’re off to see the wizard,” said The Death of Kings cheerfully.

* * *

Loki was lost, utterly lost, overcome by memories, his own and not his own. It was the smoke that roused him, followed by the sharp, shrill shatterings of divers things of glass around the flat, then the violent tremblings of the windows, more and more rapid with each moment that passed, until they set up a sound as of trapped beasts screaming in pain and fear.

Loki’s ears began to ring, as with the loud bells of temples tolling out strident alarms. He longed to clap his hands over his ears and shriek along with them.

His eyes burned and stung, streaming tears.

The penthouse blazed, flames great and small skating over every surface. Loki coughed violently, retched, coughed again, then called out to his brother, “Thor, Thor, _hjarta minn_ , where are you?”

Thor was nowhere to be seen, though the sliding doors gaped, half-torn from their frame. Loki stumbled to his feet, scarcely able to see between the stinging of his eyes, the too-bright flames, the roiling smoke, the heat.

He was a god of fire. He ought to be able to end this. Only he could not.

It was mad _Eldur Guðs_ , God’s-Fire, born of Thor’s elemental might, his insane fury, his rage.

The things his brother’s head must have known, Loki realized, his heart had not discovered until just now, and that knowledge had been the breaking of him. Loki could no more extinguish the blaze than he had been able to extinguish his brother’s wrath or pain.

Loki felt weak, and would have sunk down on the sofa, except the sofa was an inferno of flames higher than his head. He set a hand against a wall to steady himself and the brutal heat seared his palm.

“Tony?” he cried out, confused, suddenly fearful. He could feel his husband nowhere, though he ought to have felt him strongly, even when he was away.

 _Ah,_ Nornir, _the boys!_ A terrible worry struck, in that instant, Loki’s befuddled brain. _Oh, gods, my sweetest boys!_

The room was impassible, the corridor equally so. He tried. Many times, he tried. Hank had forbidden him to teleport, but Loki teleported in despite of those orders (how could he not?), straight into Fenrir’s room, where instinct, and his constant sense of the younglings, told Loki his sons might be found.

The fire had not reached them yet, though smoke curled through the cracks round the door. The two boys crouched upon the little balcony beyond Fen’s window, breathing through pillowcases tied round their faces, in the manner of bandits in the Old West films of earlier years. Clever Jöri had soaked a towel, placing it hard against the gap at the bottom of his bedroom door. It must have been Jöri, too, who unlocked the way to the balcony, which was kept bolted fast, always, for Fen’s safety--poor child, he had, clearly, been too terrified to teleport on his own, or perhaps too afraid he could not successfully bring his brother along with him.

 _Fear not, my sons, my lovely ones_. Pabbi _is…_ The room swooped sideways and Loki found himself, suddenly, landing hard and painfully on the floor on his hands and knees.

The shock of the fall made him draw in a heavy lungful of smoke, which in turn made him cough and cough until he could no longer draw breath inward again.

He knew he had no choice, no option—he must, in that very moment, catch hold of the boys and teleport them away from this danger. Far away, to a place of safety where nothing might hurt them.

Loki feared he had not the strength.

With his children in his arms, helpless and dependent upon him, he felt terror that he might step out through the curtain of space, into the cold of Between, and not find his way home again. How could he risk such a hazardous venture with his younglings?

A fist pounded thunderously upon the outer door which opened unto the chamber of the elevator. “Loki! Loki! Are you in there, man? How ‘bout about the kids? You guys okay?”

 _I’m also here, Lo._ Kurt’s thoughts touched his mind like balm. _I’m here. How can I help you?_

 _We are within._ Loki placed the words directly into Clint’s mind, and into Kurt’s, as well. _Friend Clint, you must not enter here. The danger is extreme. Most-loved Kurt..._

Loki did not want Kurt to come in either. He could not bear the sorrow if his dear friend became injured.

 _Help me, help me, Kurt,_ he wanted to say, _For we are trapped within Fen’s room, and I am afraid. My weakness is too great to carry my sons safely hence…_

 _“_ _Unsere geliebte Dame, rette uns_.” Kurt exclaimed, which was a prayer, Loki knew, to the mother of his man-god, who, like Tony’s mother, was called Maria. An instant later, Kurt appeared in a puff of his own special smoke and fire, gripping Loki almost viciously, in his own profound fear, with hands, feet and tail.

 _No! No! The children_! Loki managed.

Kurt flipped, caught hold of the boys, teleported, returned.

_There, _he sent, _The boys are with Clint. He’ll take them to a safe place, Lo. Don’t worry_.__

____

Kurt crouched, raising Loki up until they looked nearly eye-to-eye. He often forgot how strong his dear friend could be.

__

_What must we do,_ lieber Freund?

__

In an instant, Loki showed him the truth of his father’s journal, showed him the boundless senses of pain and betrayal that overwhelmed his brother’s kind heart, above all, the rage that burned so bright within the God-Fire around them, even without Thor’s presence to feed and give it life.

__

“ _Lieber Gott_ ,” Kurt said softly, aloud.

__

Behind him, the door exploded inward, the fire a solid sheet to his back, filled with the hissing of serpents, alive with furious voices. To listen to their words, Loki knew, would be madness.

__

Kurt did not turn, or show the least sign of terror. Although he bled in divers places, where sharp shards of wood sliced through his uniform, he did not falter.

__

“Guide me,” said Loki’s dearest friend, simply. He sounded sad. “I don’t really know the magic of gods, only of demons.”

__

“You are not a demon,” Loki protested, though it pained him to speak.

__

He had always thought he loved Kurt completely, but in that moment his love for his dear friend grew even greater than before, so great his heart hurt him.

__

“No,” Kurt answered, flashing suddenly his brave, cheerful grin, “But I’m not a god, either. Guide me, my friend? Use the power inside me?”

__

Loki reached, touching Kurt’s mind more deeply than he’d ever delved, drawing forth the ancient, blazing, desert might of the _Neyaphem_. Within a moment Kurt’s body blackened, darker than obsidian, darker than darkest night, darker than the cavern where the god he’d once called “Father” had kept him those two hundred years, Kurt’s shape a black hole against the oranges and reds of the flames.

__

The unbearable heat died, sucked into that other dimension, that dimension of brimstone and flame, unending.

__

Kurt’s eyes turned crimson, hotter than fire. His tail coiled like a snake soon to strike. For a moment, in his darkness, his hands rising into the air as if he reached to tear down the moon and the sun, Kurt seemed huge, and terrifying, like the demon Chernabog atop his mountain, in the " _Night on Bald Mountain_ " segment of the film _Fantasia_ , which Loki loved dearly and could watch again and again.

__

In only another moment, the flames had gone, sent _elsewhere_.

__

Only after did a hard rain begin to fall within the penthouse.

__

In that moment, Kurt was only Kurt again, kind, calm, wise Kurt, the demon within him quenched, drops of rain now beading silver on his velvety fur, diluting the blood, then soaking in to render the blue into an even richer indigo.

__

“Ah, Storm’s arrived,” Kurt said, in his ordinary cheerful manner. He gestured. “The rain, you see?”

__

Loki nodded, quite unable to speak.

__

“Geez Louise, Elf,” said Kitty Pryde, walking casually through the still-sizzling places where the fire had been, her insubstantial body impervious to the heat. “For a sec there you looked like you belonged in a Peter Jackson movie. Loki thought " _Night on Bald Mountain_." Chernabog, right, Lok? Which is not without merit as a visual."

__

Kitty looked them both up and down. “You okay, Fuzzy? You guys are bleeding like whoa.”

__

“Very well, Kätzchen,” Kurt replied. “A door exploded, rather emphatically, nearby.”

__

“Yikes," Kitty commented, pulling a face. "Lo, I’m really, really sorry, ‘cause you look hella shaky, but you’ve gotta get over to the park, I think. Northstar says a bunch of trees are blowing up there, and there’s a thunderstorm that started out strangely localized over Sheep Meadow, but now seems to be spreading—that has to be your brother, right?"

__

"And our... friends?" Kurt asked, tactfully.

__

"Oh, yeah. The Avengers are clearing out the tower, I checked that with Natasha. The nice deli lady, Mrs. Rosenblum, from downstairs, is currently stuffing your boys with cookies, Loki--so don’t worry about them, okay? Ororo will take care of any lingering fire, and our crew are getting folks out of the park. Still, I think we better skedaddle. Your bro’s not exactly having a mental health moment, huh, Lo?”

__

_I know not this “skedaddle"_ , Loki wanted to say, but he coughed long and thickly instead. His chest burned as if itself aflame.

__

He brushed Thor’s mind, ever-so-gently, with his own thoughts and found no words, no clear intentions, only emotion that burned and roiled and sizzled.

__

_My brother_ , Loki thought. _My poor, dearest brother._

__

Kurt and Kitty exchanged a look.

__

“Kurt and I can get you really, really close, hon,” Kitty said, her face creased with worry. “But after…?”

__

Ah, yes. But after.

__

That was the question.

__

* * *

__

Tony startled violently and tried to sit up.

__

A big, meaty hand, undoubtedly Happy’s, held him firmly down, in a _Don't even think about it, bub_ , kind of way.

__

“Ah, ah, ah, Boss,” he said, in genial tones. Happy might look like a hefty, somewhat out-of-shape schlub, but he was, in truth, one fucking powerful dude. He easily kept Tony from sitting.

__

At that moment he probably could have done it with one pinky finger alone. Tony felt that much like shit on toast.

__

“Where…?” Tony tried to say, only someone had replaced his throat with the Gobi Desert. The word came out something like, “Waaarch?” instead.

__

Hap chuckled sympathetically, then stuck the end of a bendy-straw in Tony’s mouth. “Just a couple sips, they said. Otherwise, you’ll probably puke, and if you puke I’ll probably puke too. I had a big lunch, so you can bet I don’t really wanna. I was stressed. I ate. I stress-ate.”

__

“Charming,” Tony said. The Gobi Desert had been replaced by the Kansas Dustbowl of the 1930’s, but he could work with it.

__

He glanced around. He was in a hospital? A kinda crappy hospital, too, by appearances.

__

“I’m still in Chicago? What the fu…” He happened to look up. An elderly gentleman in a black suit and Roman collar was standing directly outside his door, holding a serious discussion with a nun. A nun in an actual full-on habit—he hadn’t seen one of those for years. “… _fun_ damental question is, why am I still in Chicago, and not in the bosom of my family in New York?”

__

“Because you had a grand mal seizure in the back seat of the limo, Boss. Right behind me, I might add. And then you had a few more. And then I had to drag you out, stretch you out on the sidewalk, and sing “ _Stayin’ Alive_ ” while I gave you heart compressions.”

__

Suddenly Happy didn’t look happy at all.

__

“So I’m beggin’ you, okay? Please don’t do that to me again. I was really, really, really scared. Plus, there’s this.” Happy used Tony’s big beige call-light-and-remote thingy to switch on the TV.

__

The sound (shitty tech) took a few seconds to come in through the tinny little speaker on the remote, but a picture (almost equally shitty tech) was worth a thousand words, right?

__

Avengers Tower was on fire. Or, actually, not the whole tower. Mostly the penthouse, it appeared.

__

Where he lived. With his beautiful children. And his beautiful, vulnerable husband.

__

“Hap…” Tony breathed. “Our home…”

__

“I know,” Happy said sympathetically.

__

“The boys? Loki?” Tony felt sick.

__

Happy plunked down a basin in front of him. It was pink. Hospital pink. It made him think of Loki’s “oddly-shaped pink container of vomiting.”

__

He started to giggle.

__

And then he threw up.

__

Happy didn’t join the festivities after all. He rubbed Tony’s back, handed him tissues to wipe his mouth, and then took care of the basin.

__

After which, he made Tony lie back and laid a cool, damp washcloth across his forehead. It was soothing, but didn’t do anything for his terror.

__

“Hap, please, I’m really scared too,” he said. “My family…”

__

“I know, Boss.” Happy patted his hand. “I know.”

__

“Take my phone,” Tony ordered. “Call every single frickin’ name you recognize in my contacts list. Just get me someone to talk to about this!”

__

“You got it, Boss,” Happy answered. That time, he patted Tony’s shoulder.

__

“Your family will be okay,” he said, with complete confidence. “They’ve got folks lookin’ out for 'em.”

__

Not for the first time, Tony wished to the gods he possessed Hap’s optimism.

__


	14. Little Hela in Jötnarland

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hela completes her mission to Jötunnheimr and meets an unexpected someone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is a play on _Little Nemo in Slumberland_ , a heavily Art Nouveau-inspired comic strip by Winsor McCay, which ran in the New York Herald from 1905 until 1911. Though there are some attitudes that are clearly very much of their time, yet it's a surreal and often visually gorgeous body of work, and seems to suit Hela's journey.
> 
> For those of you who haven't watched _Frozen_ 800 times by now, Hela is singing bits and pieces of Queen Elsa's showstopper tune, " _Let it Go_."
> 
> The loges are those pricey theater seats at the front of the first balcony. By weird coincidence, Loge is also the name of Loki character in Wagner's _Das Rheingold_ (since Loge is sung by a tenor, you know he's actually the hero of the piece--and rightly so, he's the only being in the entire opera with a lick of sense).
> 
> Much as I love the word "cerulean," it really just means "sky blue."
> 
> The part of The Cliffs of Insanity in the 1989 movie, _The Princess Bride_ was actually played by The Cliffs of Moher, at the southwestern edge of the Burren region of County Clare, Ireland. The cliffs run for about 14 km (about 8.7 miles) and at their highest point rise to 214 meters (702 feet).
> 
> "Speak 'Friend' and enter"=the words written above the back door to the Mines of Moria in _The Fellowship of the Ring_. The writing really means exactly that--say the  
>  word "friend" and enter. However, proving wizards really are subtle and quick to anger, Gandalf totally overcomplicates things, loses his shit, and tries all sorts of ineffective spells to open the way. It takes Merry Brandybuck, one of the Hobbits, asking him about the words on the door for the wizard to catch a clue. Ali Baba uses the words "Open Sesame" to open the cave of the forty thieves in the story " _Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves_ " from _One Thousand and One Nights_. Hela, of course, is actually just using her own magic to open the throne room door.
> 
> This section uses several words and phrases from the beautiful Finnish language. I know these stories have at least one reader from Finland, so, as always, if I've made any mistakes, please feel let me know and I'll correct them!
> 
>  _Ruhtinatar_ =princess (Finnish)
> 
>  _Prinsinndóttir_ =prince's daughter (Icelandic)
> 
> Óðinn _Konungur_ =Odin the King (Finnish)
> 
> "Though she be but little, she is fierce!"=William Shakespeare, _A Midsummer Night's Dream_ , Act 3, scene 2.
> 
>  _isovanhempi_ =grandparent (Finnish)
> 
> The saying "discretion is the better part of valor" actually is taken from one of Falstaff's lines from _Henry IV, Part 1_ (our old friend Shakespeare again--Act V, scene 4), "The better part of valour is discretion." Taking hints on how to behave from Falstaff may not actually be the best idea. "Just sayin'," as Tony likes to remark.

* * *

Deaths could feel the cold of Jötunnheimr, just as they felt the searing heat of Múspellsheimr, but such things—mere environmental changes—couldn’t harm, or even truly disturb, them.

The Violent Death of Gods gave a light shiver, as if she’d suddenly run outside in the Halloween Season without a warm sweater.

The Death of Kings returned her heavy wig and elegant hat to her head, then buttoned up her caped coat. “This is what you call a ‘chill’, darling?” she asked.

Hela gave a thin smile. Extremes of temperature, hot or cold, troubled her least of all.

“ _The cold never bothered me anyway…_ ” she sang softly, spinning out a little charm of warming for the ease of her companions.

“A pretty tune,” commented The Violent Death of Gods. “And such a pretty voice, too, my dear child.”

Hela smiled again, warmly, and thanked her companion. Despite the part she played, back home in Midgard, she was no Queen Elsa, forever apart and in denial of who she was, what her talents meant. Hela knew herself perfectly, and the ability to act a role with exquisite grace had always been one of her innate abilities.

She’d had a discussion of the talent once with Auntie Natasha, but Auntie Natasha made her sad now and then, because while the parts Hela played floated gently on the surface of her being, not damaging her in the least, many of the parts Natasha played had wormed their way deep into her heart, and hurt her, just as _Pabbi’s_ roles sometimes wounded him.

He was so tender, her _Pabbi_ , so giving and so in need of love, and yet he’d often had to play parts of cruelty, indifference, or deceit, none of them roles that greatly suited his heart.

Hela, on the other hand, could sit in the loges, applaud her own stellar performances, then shut off the stage lights and be perfectly Hela again.

“Huh. Look ahead.” The Death of Kings gestured with one black-embroidered gauntlet.

Through the fine, airborne ice-crystals and swirling snow, Hela glimpsed a thin cerulean figure waiting below them, at the bottom of the path.

A _Jötnar_ warrior once, she supposed, now a _Jötnar_ survivor.

“You need not be afraid,” Hela told him gently. “As you are neither a god, nor a king, my Sisters here can never take you, and since you have fought so long and so hard a battle to stave off other Sisters of mine, I imagine you’re too stubborn in your soul to ever belong to me. I am _Siunattu Kuolema_ , Blessed Death, and I only come when invited. Today, at any rate, I’m here as a civilian, so to speak, not in my official capacity.”

The _Jötunn_ only gestured with his head.

“ _Tällä tavalla!_ ” he commanded. _This way_.

The Deaths went after him, sure-footed on the narrow, winding path as it sloped up again, until they’d reached a blue-black cliff face of dizzying height.

Dizzying, if one was capable of being made dizzy by such things.

“The Cliffs of Insanity!” The Death of Kings exclaimed.

 _Popsicles and Cult Movies,_ Hela thought—her Sister really had been spending time on Midgard.

She wondered what her Dad would say if she invited The Death of Kings, in her Highwayman attire, to movie night _chez_ Stark.

Of course, Dad had started getting increasingly blasé about such things, and harder to shock. The two of them--Death and engineer-- might very well enjoy snarking at one another.

Their guide melted away before them into the twilight and snow.

“ _Friend_ ,” Hela said without hesitation. A doorway, more than twice the height of even The Violent Death of Gods, slid open in the cliff face.

“I see what you did there,” laughed The Death of Kings. “I was going to go for ‘ _Open, sesame_ , myself!’”

Hela grinned in return. “What can I say? I’m being raised by geeks.”

Great as her respect was for The Grandmother, in The Death of Kings, Hela felt herself on the verge of making a friend, perhaps her first true friend outside of her family (Nat and Pepper, Kurt and Logan, of course, counted completely as family). She enjoyed the older Death’s sense of humour, her buoyancy of spirit. Even amongst people she knew well, and loved, who was there really to talk to, who understood all she said, except _Pabbi_? Though she never felt lonely, it never went amiss to have a friend.

The chamber they approached through the opening in the cliff appeared huge, crusted with icicles and frozen whorls that seemed once to have been intricately shaped or carved, but now had thawed and refrozen, thawed and refrozen, to the point that they looked awkward, misshapen, globbish. Distances, in such a chamber, were almost impossible to determine. And so, Hela began to sing, her crystalline voice caressing the curves and angles, reshaping the wonderful carvings to their original splendor, restoring the chamber—the throne room of the _kuninkaat_ , the kings of the _Jötnar_ —once more to its proper dimensions.

“ _Don't let them in, don't let them see_ ,” Hela sang, and as she sang something stirred within her, bringing with it a profound sense of recognition that not even the Casket of Ancient Winters had awakened.

She changed, as she never could, or had, before.

 _Be the good girl you always have to be_  
_Conceal, don't feel, don't let them know_  
_Well, now they know!_

Ten steps of blue-white ice rose before her, much like the steps in the Golden Hall of Asgard, and at the top stretched a wide platform with a screen of thin icicles behind it, shimmering like molten silver.

Outside had been dark, but this chamber was filled to bursting with light. Before the screen stood a now-ornate throne, another example of Hela's Craft.

 _Kunnia Valtaistuimen Pakkasen Jättiläinen Kuninkaat_ , whispered a voice through her head, the words of her ancestors, full of mystery and magic, valour and might.

 _The Honoured Throne of the Frost Giant Kings_.

 _Oh,_ Pabbi, she thought, sorrow welling through her, _How you were deceived!_

Hela reached into her pocket universe and carefully retrieved the Casket of Ancient Winters, cradling its weight in her arms.

The Might of the _Jötnar_.

The Heart of her people, home at long last.

She climbed the steps of ice, graceful as ever despite the slickness of the footing and her trailing black gown, placing the Casket with the greatest of tenderness on a pillar of ice by the king’s right hand (if, in fact, a king had sat upon that now-splendid throne), a pillar where, Hela knew, the Casket had not rested since before her _Pabbi’s_ birth.

She paused a moment there, feeling the presence of the chamber, of the beings within, gathering her thoughts, until at last she brushed her fingers gently across the surface of the Casket, like a loving granddaughter caressing the cheek of a beloved grandparent.

Ancient, wise and full of healing it was. So incredibly much more than a mere box filled with blue light.

Hela shut her eyes, and let the change ripple over her. She was beautiful, as beautiful as she’d ever been, as beautiful as her _Pabbi_ had been in this form, though he would never look at himself through her loving eyes.

Hela wanted to laugh and cry all at once with sheer amazement. She was no monster. She was beautiful!

Hela claimed that moment for herself alone, taking delighted stock in herself: the way her wild black hair brushed her bare shoulders, her sky-blue skin with its paler markings, the graceful spiral of her horns. She was dressed as royalty of the _Jötnar_ had once dressed, in the days before their great privations. A kilt of fine fur secured with a belt of gold scales rode just below her waist. Numerous fine gold chains interlinked across her back and chest, hung with pearls and crimson gems the exact color of her eyes. Gold rings adorned her fingers and circled her horns.

Behind the screen, someone gasped.

“ _Hys, Veli_ ,” a deep voice admonished.

 _Hush, Brother_.

Which of her uncles was the gasper, Hela wondered, and which the admonisher, Helblindi or Býleistr?

Hela thought she knew the whys and wherefores of what caused her uncle (of whichever name) to gasp. Most of the _Jötnar_ were males, intersexed like her _Pabbi._

Females were never intersexed, and not one had been born, it was said, in over 1200 years.

Her _Jötunn_ self was not a Glamour, either, no more so than her quasi- _Ӕsir_ appearance had been. Both forms equally belonged to her, as both _Pabbi’s_ (whatever lies the Allfucker told) belonged entirely to him. And here she stood before them, a female _Jötunn_.

“I am Hela Lokisdottir Stark,” she announced, her voice ringing up into the icy vaults of the chamber. “Daughter of Loki, son of Hodr and Laufey, reared upon Midgard, _Ruhtinatar_ of Jötunnheimr, and _Prinsinndóttir_ of Asgard. I bear no treachery in my intent, only that treasure which was long since stolen. I come to you, also, as an enemy of _Óðinn Konungur_ , who made away with the dear, small son of your own father, Laufey, and imprisoned him within Asgard in shame and ignorance, knowing nothing of his true father, Hodr, or of his heritage. I come here in hopes that Jötunnheimr may be freed from its chains and restored to glory, and that the mindthralls of Asgard, enslaved by their wicked king, may also be freed. I seek only the well-being of our people, and hold no designs upon the throne.”

“If this is true…” A _Jötunn_ stepped out from behind the screen. He was startlingly tall, heavily muscled, though otherwise nearly as thin as her _Pabbi_. “You are very small for such an important embassy.”

“Our great poet of Midgard wrote, ‘Though she be but little, she is fierce.’ Yes, I am small, Grand _pabbi_ , but I am also, I assure you, fierce indeed.”

The giant took a seat upon the throne. “What is that you call me, little princess?”

“You are my _isovanhempi_ , my grand _pabbi_ , Laufey, are you not? That same Laufey who honorably wed Hodr, ambassador and crown prince of Asgard, and gave birth in the heat of battle to his son, named Loki after the great hero of the _Jötnar_? The same son who was lost, as your dear Hodr, best of _Ӕsir_ , was lost, when he fell victim to his murderous father’s schemes?”

“They say the patricide Loki, most wicked of sons, slew his parent to please our enemy Odin, and has either died upon field of battle, or remains imprisoned in Asgard’s dungeons. How, if I am Laufey, can I be here to speak with you?”

“I imagine by doing the exact same thing I, or my _Pabbi_ would have done in your place—you sent a duplicate of yourself, a simulacrum, into the land of your enemies, to die in your stead. Clearly you’re too clever to have acted otherwise in such a hazardous situation. You didn’t know the boy as your son, but you must surely have sensed Odin’s malign hold upon him, the damage he had been done, his troubled and nearly-broken mind.

"Within hours he cast himself from the Bifrost and into the Abyss. Yet now he heals, and will be most cheered to know that you live. Odin truly has hurt him terribly, in mind and body, throughout the long years, and he carries the weight of your death most heavily of all upon him, for he acknowledges you fully as his parent and his king. Believe me, no love for Odin remains within his heart, and he holds no designs on this, or any other kingdom. He lives now upon Midgard with my brothers and his husband, as happy there as he is able to be, for his injuries were truly dreadful.”

“Then why do you bring the Stormcrows,” Laufey asked, lounging on his throne with a look almost of amusement, “If you mean no harm?”

“Because, as you say, I am very small, and discretion, as we sometimes say on Midgard, is the better part of valour. Also because, if you were as I hoped, I would not hurt you for my life. However, were you not as I hoped, I could not allow myself to be injured. No more would you, Laufey _Konigen_ , in my position.”

The figure on the throne vanished into a snow flurry as a second Laufey stepped from behind the screen. “Indeed, you are sharp as ice, granddaughter,” this second Laufey said. “Pray tell, did you know all along?”

Hela grinned wickedly, crimson eyes sparkling.

“Without a doubt,” Laufey said, his laugh that of a king who has not laughed in nearly 1100 years. “Oh, how you interest me, small Lokisdottir! My thanks indeed for the Casket—and also for your fine refurbishment of my hall. Sit beside me now, and we shall speak.”

“As you wish, my liege,” Hela answered simply, and this time her smile was genuine, the warmest thing in all that cold, and suddenly-splendid, place.


	15. Who Writes the Story?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki's quest to save his brother turns into more of a journey of self-discovery than he'd anticipated. Hela issues an invitation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mabon was a minor Norse festival-day, centered around the final bringing-in of the harvest and the brewing of mead.
> 
> Hela's film is Jim Henson's _Labyrinth_ (1986).
> 
>  _Gleipnir_ ("Fooler") the Dwarven-forged fetter in Norse mythology that bound Fenrir until Ragnarök. The fetter was said to look light and soft as a silk ribbon, which was how the Aesir fooled the giant wolf into allowing himself to be bound--the fetter looked so insubstantial, he didn't really believe it would hold him (though, as a kind of insurance against trickery, he required a god to put a hand inside his mouth). Tyr volunteered. Chomp.
> 
> In Greek mythology, Atlas was punished by Zeus for siding with the Titans in their war against the Olympians. When the Titans lost, most were confined in Tartarus (a realm of the dead, according to _The Iliad_ "as far beneath Hades as heaven is above earth"), but Atlas was condemned to stand at the western edge of the world and hold the sky upon his shoulders.
> 
> Although commonly associated with combat soldiers, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) can be triggered by any traumatic or terrifying life-event, whether that event has been experienced or witnessed. Symptoms may include flashbacks, nightmares and anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts or flashbacks concerning the event. Sadly, the Disorder often afflicts children who've suffered abuse.
> 
> The Beatles " _Here Comes the Sun_ ," written by George Harrison, appeared on their 1969 album, _Abbey Road_.
> 
> The spring by the roots of the World Tree, Yggdrasil, is _Mímisbrunnr_ , aka Mímir's well. A drink from the well's water is said to grant wisdom--but at a steep price. In mythology, Odin had to leave his eye in the well in return for a drink.
> 
> The Queen who appears to Loki is something of a composite of her mythological and Marvel self.

Loki could only just make out the form of his brother, a distant, indistinct shape encircled in an ever-expanding spiral of dust and tattered leaves. Soon, it seemed, that whirlwind would grow to overcome the winter-ragged patch of Central Park grass where Kurt had brought them to ground—and when it did, what then? What had Thor begun for them both, here in this place?

The hollow booming rush of the wind that spun the dust and leaves, the wavering, far-off shape of Thor, the hot flame-coloured threads of lightning that sizzled through the air, all seemed strangely familiar, like something Loki once had read of, long ago, in a book. A story of which he already knew the ending, perhaps had always known the ending.

Was this something that transpired in the previous cycle? In the one before? Or before that, before and before, back into times too distant for even the _Ӕsir_ to record, stories written only upon the earth and stones? How many unhappy pairs of brothers had met as they met now, stretching endlessly into how distant a past? How many wounded, raging, confused Lokis and Thors before them, filled with deepest hatred for one another, or warmest love, the nature of the emotions never of real consequence, only their undeniable intensity?

“Lo?” Kurt said sharply, clearly catching at least the flavour of the chaos in Loki’s head. “Loki, please, I don’t like this.”

“ _Hjarta minn_ ,” Loki told his friend, “The time has come now. You must leave me also, Kurt, as Kitty did.”

The eye of this storm was far, far too dangerous a place for his beloved friend, even with Kurt’s unparalleled agility and powers of teleportation, even with such nearly god-like abilities as he had lately displayed within the burning penthouse. Whatever lay ahead, Kurt must not suffer so much as a bruise on his or Thor’s account—and, at any rate, this was not Kurt’s story. It was theirs.

_Once there were two brothers…_

_Once there were two brothers, one light and one dark…_

Kurt, however, with a stubbornness few would credit him with possessing, who knew only his kindness and good humour, (though Loki knew better—Kurt had been dead once, altogether dead, yet had come back not through sorcery, or necromancy, or the deeds of gods, but because he simply wasn’t finished with what life had to offer him, and if that wasn’t stubbornness of the most exalted sort, Loki truly could not say what was) clung to Loki in a tight embrace that somehow seemed to involve something more than his ordinary compliment of arms and legs and tail.

“Kurt, dearest Kurt, this is not your story,” Loki told him, trying with all gentleness possible to make his friend release his hold. “However I love you, and you love me, you must now let me go. Be safe and well, and let this story play out. It is for my brother and I, and no one else.”

He tried to smile a little, though in truth he felt very afraid, for the familiar feeling had come back to him of a cycle preparing to turn, and he did not want this one to turn, not yet, with his children so young, and with the life he now had, with small Edwin inside him, and himself possessed again of Tony’s love, an existence that seemed it might, at long last, make him happier than any Loki who came before.

In truth, he did not want to let Kurt go, either. No Loki had ever possessed such a friend as Kurt, such a good and wise friend, who accepted, loved, and guided him. Perhaps, if they had, things might have ended differently.

Or not ended.

Loki wished so fervently that things would not end.

Usually, when times came for the cycles to turn, the Lokis had grown so bitter, so shattered, so rancid with hate, so full of bile and despair, they nearly begged for the change—but he did not feel that way at all. Loki wanted what he had, _all_ he had, right here, right now, and he was thrice Hel-bedamned if he would let this life slip away from him without fighting for its continuation with all that he possessed.

Kurt gave him a little shake, not enough to hurt—Kurt would never hurt him--but enough to summon Loki’s attention back from where it had drifted.

“ _My_ story is whatever I say it is!” his friend shouted over the ever-rising wind, his eyes even more fiery than usual, his blue-black curls blowing madly. “I write my own story, Lo, and so do you!”

The something else Kurt had in addition to hands, feet and tail, and used to restrain him so capably, was _seiðr_ , Loki realized, with a sense of utter shock. Kurt had suddenly manifested _seiðr_ , as if out of the _Ӕther_ , and used it to hold him powerfully, far more powerfully than he ought to have been able, as one to whom the threads of the universe, in all their myriad uses, were previously unknown. The question of how in all the Realms Kurt had managed such a thing, belonged to another time.

As Loki’s own _seiðr_ was entirely engaged with containing the force of Thor’s lightning, lest Manhattan burn to the ground, he could only let that question go for the present. As Tony might say, he had other fish to fry.

Loki grimaced (was there anything in all the Realms more disgusting than fried fish?) and glanced up.

Kurt grinned back at him, all bright eyes that crinkled at the corners, and flashing small fangs and that wonderful, reassuring sense of _Kurt_. Kurt who had flown so many years on the trapeze and never dropped a single person. Kurt, with his strong hands, and his strong heart.

Loki felt his jaw drop. He must be gaping like an idiot, but for once he could not care how he looked. Kurt would never let him go. Never. He , Loki, was loved and worthy of love, and Kurt would never let him go because when someone loved one, truly loved one, it was not merely until they wearied, or it became inconvenient, it was identical to the love he himself felt for Kurt, or for Tony, for his children, for his brother.

It was a cycle in and of itself, like one of Tony’s mysterious circuits, the power traveling, undiminished, round and round and round, more powerful than Thor’s lightning and faster than thought.

It did not belong to the _Nornir_.

It was not part of the cycle.

It was _his_.

Begun by him, to be ended by him. Except he never, never would end it--for that love, it transpired, was his life, his purpose, his meaning. He was not those other Lokis, however many there had been through countless ages, wounded into cynicism and cruelty. He was not Odin’s Loki, Frigga’s Loki, Loki of Asgard, Loki of Jötunnheimr. He was only... himself.

 _I may write my own story?_ Loki thought, and the hugeness of that realization nearly overwhelmed his concentration.

For all the many times he had claimed, defiantly, “ _I do what I want!_ ” he had never thought…

He had never thought.

Loki took his friend’s face between his hands, bending his brow against Kurt’s, breathing Kurt’s scent, which always struck him as the smell of autumn leaves, and the Northmen’s fires on Mabon-night, when the mead was brewed. Beneath his fingertips lay the warmth and velvet-softness that was ever the essential feeling of Kurt, though laid over bones as prominent as Loki’s own.

With his _seiðr_ weaving its pattern all around him, still holding on gently to his friend, he reached out into the void, gathering threads: his, small Edwin’s, the children’s, Tony’s, Thor’s, Kurt’s— the life-threads of all he held dear—and twining them round his fist (and holding his breath just for that moment, in the fear that maybe, just maybe he had miscalculated badly), cut them through in one sharp, neat stroke.

What was the line, in that film Hela liked so well, with the baby and the goblins?

 ** _"You have no power over me!_** "

“I can’t just leave you here, Loki,” Kurt was still insisting, lagging a step behind Loki now in his thoughts. “I can’t. Please don’t make me. _Gott im Himmel_ , Lo, think of the danger… Think of your children…”

“Honoured Sisters,” Loki called into the silence behind his friend's words, “I mean no disrespect, but you see, Kurt, my dearest Shield-Brother, was correct. We write our own stories, we spin our own threads. For better or ill, we must act as we will, not as you direct. I will save my brother today, and the cycle will not turn.”

Loki found himself grinning like a fool. “Oh, Kurt, the cycle will not turn!”

“Lo…” Kurt’s expression seemed very much that of a man who hopes his dearest friend has not lost what little wit he still possessed.

“Fear not, I pray,” Loki told him, nearly overwhelmed with the sudden sense of freedom and joy. “A plan takes place within me. I must have Jane, however, for she is the final and most necessary part of what I intend, and only you may bring her so near to me.”

Leaping into Kurt’s thoughts, Loki showed him exactly where his brother’s beloved might be found, the particulars of the laboratory in which she temporarily worked at Columbia, so that Kurt might teleport in with perfect safety.

Kurt wanted to weep badly, Loki saw with sorrow, for Kurt knew how weak he was in these days, so incapable, physically, of the least thing.

Yet, oddly, in that moment, Loki did not feel weak. In fact, despite his worry over Thor, he felt radiantly cheerful, as if, along with the snipping of the threads, some new, personal convergence took place, the forces of the universe, freed of the necessity of spinning into a new shape, aligning to grant him their abundant aid.

It felt odd to be the one to reassure Kurt (when Kurt, times without measure, had comforted him), and yet boundlessly reassuring that his friend did not question, or argue, only did in that moment exactly that which Loki asked of him.

 _I am trusted_ , Loki marveled. _I am trusted, and I **shall** be strong enough to save my brother_

Instead of remaining snarled into a taut, tangled ball, Loki allowed his _seiðr_ to fall open and spread, a glorious green span like the proudest of peacock-tails, each shimmering green tendril calling a thread of lighting home, grounding those myriad threads one by one by one, their power filling and restoring him.

In the distance Thor was screaming, all reason overturned by grief and anger, betrayal and utter disgust—all emotions Loki knew only too well.

He could not be afraid of his brother, or angry, or any other negative thing. He could only feel great sympathy, share Thor’s pain, and strive to reach him.

His poor brother, his poor Thor. Loki knew now in his heart that it might truly be as hard, if not harder, to be the favoured son of a wicked king.

Every act of goodness, strength or courage was now, for Thor, set upon its head to be questioned: _When I did this thing, was I truly a hero? When I did that was I in the right or in the wrong?_

Worst of all, Loki knew, was that so many of his brother’s deeds, assayed, by Thor's intent, only for the most noble of purposes, were in fact both flawed and wrong, the commands of a father who held little but evil and greed within him.

Oh, gods, his poor brother...

The baby stirred inside, then, suddenly worried and afraid, but Loki soothed him with the gentlest of touches.

 _Fear not, my small Edwin._ Pabbi _is here. We shall help your uncle, and all will be well. No harm will ever come to you_.

He showed Edwin how safe he was, warmly sheltered within Loki's own body, how Loki knew not the least unease for him—felt Edwin, too, in his sleepy and barely-formed way, trusting him completely.

 _I was made in love by Hodr and Laufey_ , Loki thought, _I am loved and trusted now, and my dear brother shall know this same healing in his heart and mind and soul._

 _In another cycle, another time, my sweet Edwin_ , he told his son, _There lived another Loki, who was me and not me. There lived another Fenrir, who both was and was not your darling brother, who finds himself frightened and BIG from time to time. It is said that other Loki, who was not such a doting_ Pabbi _as me--so you must not fear my repeating any of his deeds--allowed a fetter to be spun out to bind his sun. a magical bond made from the following things: the footfall of a cat, the beard of a woman, the roots of a rock, the sinews of a bear, the breath of a fish, and the spittle of a bird_.

 _Now, it all sounds a bit unpleasant and insanitary to me, but it is said to have held the great, angry wolf through many turnings of years_.

_How shall I make a fetter to hold a god, then, who is lost within a Múspelheimr of rage, a stranger to his usual self?_

Loki had not expected an answer. He had thought, in fact, he spoke only to himself, as a way to focus his thoughts and calm his nerves.

And yet, the small, sleepy voice within answered him _…not a fetter…_

Loki’s breath caught. He could see Thor clearly now, just up a little rise of Sheep Meadow— perhaps the same rise where he’d fallen when he tumbled to earth upon escaping Latveria, or perhaps not.

It scarcely mattered, really, one way or another.

What mattered was that Thor had gone down on one knee, his muscles straining as if, like Atlas in the stories of the Ancient Greeks, he sought to hold the entire sky away by the strength of his mighty arms. Sweat had entirely soaked through his dark-grey shirt, which was ripped and rent as if cruel beasts had attacked, more sweat runneling those glimpses of flesh that showed beneath the tears, just as ever-fresh tears runneled his cheeks.

Small Edwin had been absolutely correct: Thor did not require fetters. He needed a lifeline, a cord of affection and caring to pull him from that terrible place into which he’d fallen so far, and so headlong.

Loki had known that in his heart’s heart, had he not? Why else should he have sent for Jane?

And yet, how to begin? That was the trouble.

 _Lok?_ came Clint’s voice, inside his head. _Wanted you to know, the park’s clear. Nat’s with me, too. We had Bruce hold back until all else fails._

 _And your Phillip?_ Loki responded.

_Also holding back. Remember, though—he gets antsy, and he does like his guns and his helicopters._

_Assure him, please, Clint, that they will not be needed. No harm will be done this day,_ Loki told him. _I have come to heal my brother, not to fight with him._

 _Loki, that’s…_ Clint began.

 _Pretty damn smart_. Natasha’s voice inside his head was tart and crisp, like the flavour of those green-skinned apples he liked, that Thea Ransome had told him were called “Granny Smiths.”

Apples made him think of Tony, and the thought of Tony made Loki wish with every bit of himself that his husband could be here.

Perhaps that Tony was not here could be seen as for the best, however. Like Clint’s Phillip, Tony did enjoy to shoot first and ask questions after, now and then.

All that, Loki knew, could--and must--be avoided.

Loki made his inner voice that of a supplicant. _Honoured Shield-Brother of my brother, honoured Shield-Sister of my brother, I know that you have not greatest cause, in times past, to trust in me. Yet, I must ask you if you will grant me the boon of your belief, upon this occasion, knowing only that I wish to rescue my most-beloved Thor from what you would term Hell. He harms no one of his own volition, but from the illness, also known to Midgardians, which afflicts the broken minds of warriors who have struggled overlong in the field of battle._

 _P.T.S.D?_   Clint asked quietly.

 _That very ailment_ , Loki agreed. _Tony spoke of it so, and also in the context of children. Children who…_

Loki found he could not go on.

He stopped, so close to his brother now he might have brushed Thor’s shoulder with the tips of his fingers, yet Thor did not know him at all.

To his surprise, it was Natasha, not Clint, who answered first, and Loki found himself refreshed by the sweet-tartness of her presence in his mind.

_Whatever you need, Lok. Help yourself._

_Oh, hell, why not?_ Clint chimed in, laughing. _It’s not like you’re a stranger, right?_

Slowly, carefully, Loki inched toward his brother, not wishing to startle him if he happened to awaken suddenly from his state of frozen madness, and feel even a brother's approach as threatening.

He remembered Tony speaking often of the “StarkTunes in his head,” and had often heard, woven within his thoughts, words and snippets of guitar-work (Tony called them “riffs”) and divers other instruments, all bits of the harsh music Tony favoured above all other sorts.

Of late, as he became more greatly acquainted with the music of Midgard, as music came to accompany at least a great part, if not all, of his days, Loki had noted a similar tendency within his own thoughts, and also within Thor’s.

The music Thor favoured was simple yet joyous, as suited Thor’s true nature, and above all he enjoyed the music of those called "The Beatles." It was this love Loki used to begin the cord he spun, the core of his dear brother’s lifeline, which would draw Thor home to him again.

Loki spread the words and tune delicately into Thor’s mind, matching each perfectly to what already slept within:

 _Little darling, it's been a long cold lonely winter_  
_Little darling, it feels like years since it's been here_  
_Here comes the sun, here comes the sun_  
_And I say, it's all right..._

Over and around the cheerful hopefulness of the words Loki set his own hopeful and loving thoughts, everything telling Thor the time of loneliness and pain had gone, that all would be well, all would be well.

He twined Clint’s thoughts in next, and then Natasha’s, the minds of a brave Shield-Brother and Sister who wished Thor only well, as all the while his _seiðr_ drew away the fire and rage of Thor’s lightning. Until it became perfectly safe to come near.

Until Loki could kneel, and bring his brother nearer still to him, his heart against Loki’s heart, Thor trembling in his arms.

Loki experienced a pang of guilt as he relieved Thor’s hand, gently, of the burden of Mjolnir, tucking her neatly into a pocket universe for safekeeping until his brother might need her again.

Who was to say he wasn’t worthy to touch, or wield her? Odin? That—as Tony again might say—was a laugh.

He was a true a Prince of Asgard--the rightful Crown Prince, in fact, eldest son of an eldest son-- and he sought only good in taking the weapon.

Loki found himself laughing, holding his brother tighter, Thor cuddled up against him like one of the children who had suffered a bad dream.

Chances were he had been worthy all along, within his heart, and had never guessed.

From nearby in the pocket universe, Loki had the sense of Mjolnir laughing with him.

_Now you realize, young prince._

_Let us keep that between ourselves_ , Loki told her. _I would not want to steal Thor’s thunder._

He laughed again at himself, his own words. _Literally, I suppose that would be._

He felt from the great hammer a sense of fondness. A sense that she was safe, that all was well, even as Thor crumpled against him, perhaps not even knowing Mjolnir had gone, only that he had been relieved of a burden he could not at that moment carry.

A pop of imploding air reached Loki’s ears, the tang of sulphur stung his nose. Kurt, and with him a flurry of confusion, and something near fear, that could only be Jane.

Loki did not wait, only reached for her consciousness, soothing her distress as he touched her, twining the delicate mortal flutter of her thoughts into the cord of safety he plaited for his brother, adding in the soft, sleepy awareness of the children who would be Thor’s own, his boy-child and his girl-child, so happily suspended now within Jane’s womb.

Thor had not asked to meet them before, perhaps had not known it could be done, yet there they were—Thor’s brash, brave, _Valkyrja_ daughter, so much like Thor himself, his son who would be quieter, scholarly, like his mother, like Hodr, like Loki himself, at times, their natures, already their own, that would flourish and blossom with their mother and father’s love.

Loki felt, too, the way Jane loved his brother, and it was not what he had thought.

She held great tenderness within her, yet something of the _Valkyrja_ too, a driving, razor intelligence that belied the slightness of her physical body, almost too great for such a tiny body to hold.

Loki recalled how she’d struck him, that day in Asgard—no hesitation, no regret, as if her entire fiery soul had gone into the blow. In that moment he truly had liked and respected her, as he liked and respected her now, when she was quiet and patient, following his lead, watching the thread he wove from lightning and love and _seiðr_ spill from his fingers, cocooning Thor in its tender coils until every bit of him was hidden, every bit of him still, lying within Loki’s arms as the wind died down, and the night of another world quietly fell.

Dark moss stretched beneath them, damp from _Mímisbrunnr_ , the little spring that bubbled there, gently watering the stretching roots of the great ash tree that towered over their heads, a million stars caught in its branches.

Ratatoskr, the squirrel, scampered back and forth along the lowest branch, scolding Loki mightily.

“Hush, you maker of troubles,” Loki chided him in return. “There are more lies and mischief within your small hide than I ever thought of making.”

Ratatoskr chattered angrily, bouncing on his branch.

Beneath him, Loki felt the slow rumble of the earth as Níðhöggr the dragon’s mighty jaws ground away at the World Tree’s roots.

"Dragon, be still," he said--and it was so.

Loki felt very thirsty then, and wished that he could drink from the spring, but on second thought considered that such magic draughts generally ended badly, and that he could wait to slake his thirst in some safer place, one that did not reek of expectation and fate. That the waters were said to be beneficial to Yggdrasil did not mean that they would be equally benign to such a discredited god as himself.

So, instead of quenching his thirst on those dubious waters, Loki lay back on the moss beside his brother, listening to Thor’s now peaceful snores, Ratatoskr’s scolding, the murmur of the wind in the World Tree’s branches, the hum of stars, planets, Realms turning on their courses.

He felt peaceful, having done well--he hoped--in what he set out to do. He wondered if the _Nornir_ would come, and if they did come, what they would have to say to him.

When Thor faded away from his arms, Loki found himself slightly surprised—then more than slightly astounded at the sight of the woman who finally _did_ appear in that still place, though why that was, he could not have said. Of all the gods, she alone might certainly walk where she would.

“There’s a game my children play,” Loki told her, “Called _Twenty Questions_. One says “Who am I?” and then the others have to guess. Given twice twenty, I should still not have known to guess you, Majesty, as she who would be next to arrive in this place.”

The queen laughed brightly then (though the sound was dulled and darkened somewhat by the dead side of her face), and removed her branching black headdress, setting it amongst the roots of the tree.

“But I haven’t yet said if I’m animal, vegetable or mineral, my dear not-father,” she told him.

“You aren’t any of those things, Hela,” Loki answered.

She laughed again. “Truly said, _Pabbi_. I'm here for you. Would you like to come along with me now?”

“That would entirely depend on the destination,” Loki answered.

“Mmn, cheeky!” Queen Hela grinned. “Sadly--as far as I'm concerned, at least, for my Realm would be made far more interesting by your presence--it is not what you might term the final invitation you'll receive from me. I fear I shall not long be allowed to share the pleasure of your company, as on a hill in Midgard an interfering creature called a Bruce Banner—do you know it?—is at the moment pushing very hard upon your chest--oh, dear, was that a rib?—in an effort to pull you back from my country and into his. Furthermore, I suspect your very busy little daughter would be quite cross with me for keeping you for my own instead of merely relaying the invitation she sent by me. And I did promise her. She’s quite a firecracker, isn’t she, your little Hela? So determined. So indomitable. I found I like her quite a lot. And perhaps—this is just between us, dear—fear her a little.”

“And what was the invitation, Majesty?” Loki asked.

Queen Hela turned to him the dead side of her face, the side that forever coldly grinned, that coldness greater, sharper, this time, than ever in the past.

“’It’s showtime,’ your Hela says. ‘Will you attend?’”

 

Pictures, anyone?

[Yggdrasil](http://orig14.deviantart.net/4dc6/f/2012/206/3/8/the_legend_of_yggdrasil_by_kathamausl-d58iv1q.jpg)  [Mimisbrunnr](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b1/Odin_am_Brunnen_der_Weisheit.jpg/330px-Odin_am_Brunnen_der_Weisheit.jpg) [Ratatoskr](https://dfep0xlbws1ys.cloudfront.net/thumbsb7/12/b712a77eb6488ddded8ceec71e1f1814.jpg?response-cache-control=max-age=2628000) [ Níðhöggr](http://www.curtiestouchofcolor.com/wp-content/uploads/nidhoggr-dragons-pinterest-viking-tattoos-and-tattoo-nidhogg-norse.jpg) [The Binding of Fenrir](http://www.germanicmythology.com/works/IMAGES3/OFWTheBindingofFenrir.jpg)


	16. Red Rover, Red Rover

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce finally gets what everyone's been telling him. Tony, in Chicago, receives a big surprise. An implacable Hela meets up with Loki on the Rainbow Road to Asgard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The horrific Boxing Day Tsunami on December 26, 2004 took the lives of 170,000 people in India and nearby countries.
> 
> The Pamplona _Encierro_ (Running of the Bulls) takes place during the San Fermin festival, from July 6-14 each year. The bulls run every day at 8 A.M., starting on July and continuing until the last day of the festival. The people who run ahead of the bulls are required to be 18, run in the same direction as the bulls, not tease the bulls, and not be drunk.
> 
> Barrel Full O’ Monkeys, etc., were all games popular when Tony and Bruce were kids, though some, like Jacks, are much older. Red Rover has now been banned on playgrounds everywhere, probably for being too much fun. Or (just possibly) dangerous. Barrel Full o' Monkeys was actually more of a parlor game. The litersized plastic barrel was full of brightly colored plastic monkeys, and players took turns trying to hook up new monkeys from the carpet without losing any from their chains. When all the monkeys were gone, the player with the longest chain won. After three or four monkeys on a chain, the game became fiendishly difficult, because all those mischievous monkeys just wanted to jump off again and rejoin their friends in the carpet jungle.
> 
> FUBAR is an acronym for fucked up beyond all recognition.
> 
> A recipe for Russian Tea, excellent for those times when your friend the Norse god has destroyed your local park: [All-Natural Russian Tea](http://www.geniuskitchen.com/recipe/russian-tea-all-natural-210578#activity-feed) 
> 
> "shiner"=black eye 
> 
> "hick"=an unsophisticated person from a rural area
> 
> "pronto"=right away
> 
> "shotgun seat"=the front seat next to the driver
> 
> "streaker"=a person running in the nude
> 
> "toast"=totally destroyed
> 
> "Conjunctivitis"=pinkeye (inflammation of the conjunctiva, the thin clear tissue that covers the white part of the eye and lines the inner eyelid)
> 
> "elephant in the room"=the giant, unmissable thing no one talks about
> 
> _Mr. Ed_ was a 1960's TV sitcom about a talking horse. Yes, really. It ran for 143 episodes, from 1961 to 1966.
> 
> W.B. Yeats's poem " _The Second Coming_ " was written in 1919, first printed in _The Dial_ in November 1920, and later reprinted in the 1921 collection, _Michael Robartes and the Dancer_. His poem " _Aedh Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven_ " appeared in his book of poetry, _The Wind Among the Reeds _in 1899.__

* * *

All the way back in ’04, Bruce had been working (aka hiding out from his stateside troubles) at a free clinic in Tamil Nadu when the Boxing Day Tsunami hit the coast of India. Even miles inland, where the clinic squatted on a patch of ironically dry and barren land, the slap of the giant wave on the shore had sounded like a monstrous thunderclap.

Or like the sudden, unexpected blow of Brian Banner’s rough adult hand against his own soft, childish cheek, an ear-splitting noise that made the whole world fling itself sideways.

Bruce, and Dr. Korrapati, the tiny, elderly Indian woman who served as the clinic’s other doctor, and Giles Austin, the big, silent Kiwi who was their orderly, had all glanced up, their breath stuck in their throats, knowing, just knowing, something awful had occurred, not knowing what it was, their minds not even able to comprehend yet what would come, the hundreds of thousands dead (over a third of them children), the whole world of Tamil Nadu reduced to mud, broken brush and oversized, shattered matchsticks, that had once been people’s homes.

It was been the worst devastation Bruce had ever seen, the worst he'd ever expected to see, even if he lived a hundred years. Worse than anything he could have imagined, even in his most hellish dreams.

Right now, though, Central Park had that beat all to shit. It looked like Hurricane Sandy, Hurricane Katrina and the Boxing Day Tsunami had met up over Sheep Meadow for a drunken brawl.

Most of The Lake appeared to have become airborne, only to come to earth again in one huge splash on the meadow's gently rolling hills, replacing the once-smooth winter-beige grass (every blade already stripped away by the frenzied winds) with a pig-sty wallow of mud studded with a plethora of random objects dredged up from the lake-bed.

Half Central Park’s graceful old trees had shattered to matchsticks even smaller than the matchsticks of Tamil Nadu, and now lay scattered randomly here, there and everywhere, like some mammoth game of Pickup Sticks abandoned by thoughtless kids.

But Thor wasn’t a thoughtless kid. He was a decent guy, sunny, hard-working, nearly always good-humored. It was just, Bruce suspected, that his world had been shattered even worse than the trees.

Bruce wished Tony was there, or that Steve didn’t have his noble, patriotic head jammed so far up his noble, patriotic butt. He badly needed someone to be the leader. He needed someone to be the dad, to give the orders and whip things into shape. To have everything make sense again.

He doubted someone like himself, who’d spent so much of his time on earth running, could ever learn how to lead. He didn’t have it in him.

Bruce felt sick. Physically. He also felt incapable of action, like he just wanted to sit there in the squishy mud and cry out everything inside him.

He felt bereft. Loki’s slender hand, curled inside his broad, stubby one, seemed so lifeless, and so cold. Bruce's only lifeline at the moment, had become the quiet rise and fall of Kurt’s voice, sounding very far away, though, really, Kurt knelt quite close, Loki's head and shoulders propped on his knees.

The wind rose again for a moment. The Pickup Sticks shifted a little, then stilled.

This was another place suddenly, not a world Bruce knew. He recognized nothing around him.

His heart pounded, though he felt no need to Hulk Out.

Did anyone play Pickup Sticks anymore, he wondered. Did kids these days join up in the playground for games of Barrel Full o’ Monkeys, Jacks, Hopscotch, Four-square, Red Rover?

_Red Rover, Red Rover, let Brucie come over…_

Bruce shivered suddenly. Whose voice was that in his head? He didn’t want that voice inside him, couldn’t he have Loki’s voice back instead?

Loki’s voice was like singing, or the voice of some wonderful instrument, unfamiliar but instantly loved.

Wasn't that a funny thought? Bruce Banner, president and founding member of _No Lokis in Our Clubhouse_ , suddenly _wanting_ Loki, who he’d bad-mouthed on every possible occasion, to anyone who would listen, for nearly a year and a half.

This would be because he was crazy-jealous, and unforgiving and--as his BFF Tony would surely point out--a total fucking idiot. Tony would also say, “ _Ignorance is no excuse_ ,” and maybe, if he was feeling particularly cranky, slip in an, “ _I told you so, bro_ ," for good measure.

Bruce knew he richly, richly deserved every word. He'd even boycotted, in the rudest possible way, the wedding of the best friend he'd ever had, merely to make his pissy point. Worst of all, he suspected he couldn't even blame more than a fraction of his hideous behavior on the machinations of Tony's evil A.I., J.A.R.V.I.S.

His face felt wet. Why was his face wet? Such a salty wetness couldn't be lake water.

The part of Bruce with medical training informed him it recognized various symptoms of shock in his reactions. Externally, he didn't have a scratch on him. Internally? Totally and completely FUBAR.

He'd tried to bring life back to a dying god. And failed. Miserably.

_Red Rover, Red Rover, let Brucie come over._ …

The voice sounded louder now. Still just in his head, but it made Bruce’s ears ring, and a nauseating dread fill his belly.

Bruce knew that voice. Sure, he did. It belonged to that boy. The ringleader. The King of the Bullies.

Roger, wasn't that his name? No, Trevor. Trevor Henricks, with his blotchy freckles, eyes so pale they looked almost like water, and thin, sneering lips like earthworms.

Trevor called him over with that damned, superior, taunting voice, and Bruce, skinny, wimpy, stressed-out little Bruce Banner, Brian's son, had to come, of course.

That was Red Rover. That was how you played the game. Two lines of kids taking turns to call, and if you heard your name you ran, ran, fast as you could at the other team, trying to crash though the barrier of their linked hands. It was the only way to go home again.

Red Rover, Bruce suspected, would have been loads of fun played with friends, only Bruce didn't have any friends.

And home? Hell, what did that word even mean?

Stunted, wheezy little kid that he’d been, sudden rage and hatred for Trevor had filled Bruce’s chest and he’d charged over like the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, only with less regard for human well-being.

And that—let it be recorded--decades before experiments or gamma rays or any hint of turning big or green, had been the real debut of The Other Guy on the Stage of Mortal Endeavors.

It was only a game, only a playground pickup game of Red Rover, but Bruce had given free rein to his inner rage beast and Trevor Henricks had flown backward through the air as if he’d suddenly sprouted wings. The impact of Bruce’s shoulder with Trevor’s chest broke two of the King Bully’s ribs, leaving him a king no longer, but only a hurt, sobbing little boy laid out flat on his back on the asphalt, snot and blood both flowing freely from his nose.

Bruce had been appalled, both by himself, his own behavior, and the abundance of his enemy’s bleeding. His recent lunch (hamburger gravy over mashed potatoes) chose to make a reappearance onto the blacktop at that point, and for the first time in his life he’d run away from school.

Not far, though. Bruce had no _far_ to run to. Just half a mile or so, to where a little creek wound its way through a copse of cottonwoods. He climbed up into one of the cottonwood trees and cried and cried and cried until he wanted to be sick again.

For the first time, then, Bruce knew exactly what he was: a monster, just like his father. The realization truly sickened him, even more than the violence itself.

Now, sitting flat on his behind on a muddy-but-otherwise-stripped-bare hill in Sheep Meadow, Bruce wiped his mouth, probably for the tenth time in a row. He hadn’t meant to throw up on this occasion either, though he had, almost the moment he felt Loki’s ribs snap under his hands. The world got swimmy, his stomach started to flip and he’d only just managed to turn away.

While he was puking, Kurt took over with the CPR. Of course, that was when Loki came back to life again—started breathing on his own, anyway.

Loki remained deeply, deeply unconscious, blood trailing from his nose and ears, but he lived. It seemed like a judgment, that after bringing Thor back from his badness he’d just lain completely limp, unmoving, unbreathing, under Bruce’s hands, but returned almost instantly to Kurt’s in-every-way-superior touch.

Bruce was scared to let go of Loki’s hand. He knew he was being an idiot, that these weren't the thoughts of a rational man, but he had this paranoid idea that if he let go, he'd be judged again, he'd undo Kurt's good work. Loki would stop breathing and be alive nevermore, and it would all be his fault.

Bruce needed Loki to be alive, so he held on tightly.

If Loki died while Tony was away…

If he died before Bruce could try to make things right…

Loki looked so thin, so fragile, so otherworldly, the thin ribbons of blood too red against his white, white skin, but he looked beautiful, too.

He’d been gone such a terribly long time. If he’d been human, Bruce wouldn’t have kept working--not beyond ten or so minutes--or let Kurt take over.

Maybe he actually shouldn’t have kept working as long as he did. Bruce just needed Loki to be alive so badly it hurt him.

He’d been inside Loki’s head, and Loki had been inside his, and yes indeed, folks, _that_ was the biggest game-changer he could have possibly imagined.

“Bruce, it will be all right, please trust me,” Kurt told him.

Bruce clung desperately to the gently-inflected music of his words, as the soft, blue coils of Kurt's tail twined briefly around the meeting of his and Loki’s hands. “Never fear, _mein Freund_.”

It struck Bruce, suddenly, that in the half-dozen years he’d known the young German, he’d never looked at him correctly. He’d wondered (pityingly) where on earth Kurt got his confidence, his courage. He realized he (who’d always thought himself just as open-minded on the mutant question as on the question of other people’s sexuality) had automatically assigned Kurt a kind of second-class citizenship in his head.

He’d thought of Kurt as a freak (not that he would ever have used the word), as someone with an insurmountable disability, someone who needed to hide.

Kurt had probably guessed at his opinions, but liked him anyway, because that’s what he did. He liked people. Kurt had seen the best in Victor von Doom, for god’s sake.

What Bruce had never recognized before was that Kurt, supposedly his friend, was perfect exactly as he was. From his intelligence, good-humor and kindness, to his smiling elfin face, to his useful and expressive tail, to the strength and consummate grace of his body, he was perfectly himself, perfectly perfect, "perfectly Kurt," as Loki would say, with love for his friend shining in his face.

As Loki was perfectly Loki--and that’s where Bruce found himself drowning.

He’d known all along that Loki, and Thor too, despite the centuries since their births, were hardly more than kids. They aged themselves up as protective coloration—to be taken seriously, he supposed, and be seen as legitimate parents to their children and to not make their partners feel like cradle-robbers—but they were really just boys, the equivalent of college kids at most.

In Thor’s case, a well-intentioned jock. In Loki’s something infinitely more complex. What he _wasn’t_ , most definitely, was the guy who'd strutted his way across the earth demanding that everyone kneel.

Loki had his points of pride, sure, and he could act princely as hell--but then, he _was_ a prince. Legitimately. Around and behind all that lived a complicated, brilliant, sweet, deeply-wounded, fiercely loyal and infinitely-loving person who'd fought to the end to save his brother. Fought not with violence, but with something so indescribably amazing Bruce could hardly comprehend.

Bruce had come to the park, seen the devastation and expected he’d need to Hulk Out, maybe fight the thunder god to a standstill while someone came up with a way to trap and contain him. Instead, Bruce found himself woven into the lifeline Loki spun for his brother, caught up in the shining rope of pain and memory, love and forgiveness that Loki spun so skillfully.

For that brief time, Bruce had been part of all of them: his teammates, Phil, Kurt, Loki and Jane and their unborn children. Joined together, they became family, and he never wanted to leave them.

They became _his_ family, and Bruce couldn’t bear the separation.

He’d been so wrong, so unforgivably wrong, and being merely sorry for the things he'd said and done now seemed entirely insufficient.

“Bruce? Take this.” Someone put a paper cup in Bruce’s hand, holding his fingers wrapped around the corrugated cardboard sleeve when his grip had no strength.

A small hand, much smaller than his own. Natasha’s?

“I…” Bruce attempted.

“It’s Russian tea. Try it. It’s good.”

Bruce sipped. She'd brought him a strong black tea flavored with orange and lemon, cloves and cinnamon, and very sweet, just the way he liked it. He could have cheerfully drunk gallons of the stuff.

“We Russians deal with a great amount of sorrow,” Natasha said, with that particular smile she had, a genuine smile, though it always left her eyes sad. “For that you need a truly excellent tea. How are you feeling, Bruce?”

She gave a small nod then, and Kurt disappeared, bamfing away with Loki still in his arms.

Bruce cried out at the sudden emptiness of the hand that had been holding tight to the god’s.

“It’s all right,” Natasha told him. “You’ll be all right. You’re just feeling a little scrambled. I think we all are. Phil and Clint held onto each other, not saying a word, for something like ten minutes. I cried. Me. I never cry, Bruce. _Never_.”

“I know.” Bruce was amazed by his own voice, by how tiny and shaky it sounded. “Where’d everyone go?”

“Back to the tower, mostly. The fire’s completely out. Nobody got hurt. Loki, Thor and Dr. Foster will be in the infirmary for a bit with Dr. McCoy and Kurt. Clint and Phil are looking after the little boys. Cap’s… well, you know.”

Natasha offered him her hand, helping Bruce make an ungainly lurch-and-stagger to his feet.

“In Buckyland,” Bruce said.

“Not here,” Natasha answered, with unusual primness.

She didn’t let Bruce go afterwards, just curled her fingers more warmly around his and stooped to retrieve her own cup of tea from the ground.

Slowly they ambled toward Strawberry Fields, and from there to Central Park West. Despite the police cars, fire trucks, throngs of confused civilians and the First Responders trying to reassure them, everything seemed strangely quiet, as if they’d sidestepped into another, more muted world.

“I can’t tell whether the world just got sweeter or scarier or a whole lot more exciting,” Natasha said, tossing her empty cup into a trash can. “I think I’m looking forward to finding out.”

“I’m still really confused,” Bruce confessed, “However, this is the best tea I ever had. I was wrong, Natasha, for such a long time. I was so, so wrong.”

“I know,” Natasha said, with her own particular brand of brisk sympathy. “I've been there, Bruce. It hurts, doesn’t it, being so wrong?”

"Yeah, it does," Bruce said, "A lot, actually." Which was nothing but the truth.

He'd been wrong about another thing, too, though. The leader he was looking for wasn't Tony or Steve, she was right here beside him, kind, and warm, and taking care of everything.

* * *

Happy had on his troubled face. His face that said, _Boss, this really isn’t a great idea._ The face that made him look like a man-sized, constipated Teddy Bear.

Gods knew, he was probably right. Tony felt weird. As in not good weird. But if Happy honestly expected him to lie there in bed when his house had literally been on fire and his children nearly burned, Central Park was a disaster-area, and he couldn’t reach by any means his husband, kids, brother-in-law, The Avengers, Pepper, Kurt, Logan, Jane or anybody else who could tell him any damn thing about what the fucking hell was going on back home, he had another thing coming. Tony Stark wasn't going to loll here in his Our Lady of Perpetual Irritation (or wherever the hell this damn hospital was called) bed one second longer than he absolutely needed to, that was for sure.

No, Tony Stark intended to go straight to said home, whatever remained of it. Now. Happy had tried to placate him by asking Björk (which so wasn’t the actual name of Hap’s cute-as-a-button Icelandic girlfriend) to scoot over to Avengers Tower and check on what was up, but she seemed to immediately get sucked into the same black hole that had swallowed everyone else.

No information forthcoming.

So here he found himself, determinedly heading homeward against all medical advice, pretending not to cling to Happy’s arm because he felt too oogie to walk quite right on his own, but too damn stubborn to ride in the relative comfort of a wheelchair.

The powers-that-were had, with bribery, allowed Hap to park just off the ambulance bays, the better to make Tony's exit both fairly anonymous and conveniently close, and he'd begun to shuffle his way through the E.R., wondering if a five minute break, lying down on one of the curtained beds ,might be in order, when evens took a... turn.

To say the least.

The first indication was the screaming. LOUD screaming. Screaming with an interesting, resonating quality, at a volume you wouldn’t really expect to be produced by human vocal cords. A peculiarly resonating quality, in fact, with which Tony was intimately familiar, as that same quality was also shared, upon occasion, by four out of five members of his own household, who, even though they were generally quiet-spoken and genteel, fully possessed the innate ability to also be ear-splittingly fucking loud. Any one of them could have broadcast " _The Star-Spangled Banner"_ at full volume to the cheapest seats in Yankee Stadium without benefit of a microphone.

As, it seemed, could the screamer, though he wasn't exactly performing the National Anthem.

This soul-destroying din was shortly followed by the appearance of a fighting, bucking, scratching, spitting, clearly-crazy-with-terror kid.

Four cops and as many EMT’s struggled to restrain the boy, but they'd totally failed to get him into handcuffs and the tall, wiry kid looked increasingly close to winning the fray, especially since the adults appeared to be tiring and the boy, who possessed the more or less the moves of a champion gymnast, didn’t show the least sign of slowing down.

As a third sign, the boy wasn’t just white, as in Caucasian, or even albino, he was _white_ , as in somewhere on the scale between Hela and Loki, something made all the more apparent by the boy also being buck-naked. His hair, by contrast, was wavy, night-sky-with-heavy-clouds black, and hung nearly to his ass. He’d managed to pick up a hell of a shiner somewhere in his travels, and that eye had pretty much swollen shut, but the other, unswollen, eye was big, expressive, and green as malachite. He looked exactly like Loki, when Loki found himself super-upset about something, and accidentally drifted into looking particularly young.

“Hap,” Tony said urgently. “Talk Icelandic to that kid. Tell him it’s okay, those men won’t hurt him, but he has to chillax and stop fighting them.”

Happy shot him a look, but did as Tony told him. Let it never be said that Hap failed to be a star employee.

In the time it took Happy to get out a handful of sentences, all the fire drained out of the boy. He slumped down to the dingy white tile on his bare butt, his hands in bunched fists pressed against his ribs.

His hands--this hit Tony smack in the face--in bunched fists because he’d never had _fingers_. His heart broke a little. This poor, damn kid had never even had _hands_.

Because this poor damn kid had to be Sleipnir. He had to be. Loki's perpetually enchanted son. Fucking, _fucking_ Odin.

Wait... Loki's perpetually enchanted son, who'd suddenly landed smack dab in the city of Chicago, where Tony just happened to be?

“Guys. Guys, please," he said to the officers and EMT’s. "Guys, god, thanks so much for finding him! His name is Sleipnir Lokison. He’s a relative of my spouse, from Iceland, and he was on his way to us in New York when he got separated from his escort. He has... uh, you know, issues... and he doesn’t speak any English. Plus, he comes from so far out in the country even the hicks think he's a hick—you know the kind of place, no noise, no cars, no people, not a damn thing but sheep and snow, far as the eye can see. I’m sure he just got scared. One of my sons is mildly autistic, though he’s just little, and he gets that way too. Just scared. He doesn’t mean to hurt anyone."

Tony turned to the boy. " _Ert þú, Sleipnir_? Did you?”

The kid shook his head, and damned if he didn't have the Loki puppy eyes. Okay, puppy eye, maybe, at the moment, but that by no means diminished the effect.

“See, he’s all right now. He didn’t mean to hurt anyone. Are you guys all okay? Did he do any damage? Hurt any property?” Tony turned on them the most perfect, shit-eating, Tony-Fuckin’-Stark grin he'd ever employed in his life. “The big man beside me with pie on his face is Happy Hogan, my head of security. His flunkies were supposed to track down our lost kiddo. Clearly they lack your skills. Honestly, you rock my world."

Tony squatted, studying his stepson face-to-face. That Sleipnir was a beautiful boy went without saying--he was Loki's. He looked maybe twelve or so in Midgardian years, with a sensitive mouth and (now) a gentle, if somewhat lost, expression.

”Sleipnir?” Tony said softly, trying not to spook the kid, or stumble too much over the still-unfamiliar words. “ _Ég er_ Tony _, faðir_ Hela _er. Vinsamlegast ekki vera hræddur_."

_I’m Tony, Hela’s father. Please don’t be afraid_.

“Hela, _systir mín_?” Sleipnir asked shyly in return.

_Hela, my sister?_

Happy answered with an extended flood of words, while Tony straightened creakily.

“Guys, he pretty much looks okay. What do you say we maybe make the kid a bedsheet toga or something, I take care of any paperwork you need done, and we get him back to New York and out of your hair, pronto?" Tony grinned again, masking a perfectly legitimate worry that his new stepson might suddenly freak out again and turn back into an eight-legged horse.

For which this wouldn't be an opportune time.

Like there'd _ever_ be a good time for a public boy-to-horse transformation.

"And," he continued, "I guess I'd better tell my number-crunchers to double the reward for finding him, half to the Police Benevolent Fund, half to the Fire Department Widows and Orphans. I really can’t thank you enough, men. His cousin’s been frantic, and you know how it is—when your better half is frantic, you better be frantic too, or else. I know Sleip, here, was a pain, but he’s really a pretty good kid, and god knows what might have happened out there. Thanks so much for saving him. You’re total heroes in my book.”

_And now, shut up, Stark,_ Tony told himself. _Warm, sincere smile. No babbling. Business as usual._

Happy glided in to drape his jacket around Sleipnir’s shoulders, rendering him (owing to the fact of Hap being a big, beefy guy, while Sleipnir was Loki-slim and far from grown yet to his full height) more or less decent for public viewing, then whisked him off for a quick cleanup in the men’s room.

Tony commandeered an empty conference room to spread a little more bullshit, knowing full well he was being beyond slick as he wove his cloth of lies, knowing too that the slickness was necessary for the authorities' own protection. He doubted they’d want to explain their doe-eyed teenage captive changing suddenly to Mr. Ed in their holding cells, and Tony personally didn’t want Sleipnir examined by any Midgardian doctor except Hank McCoy, that part being entirely for Sleip's own protection. It still gave Tony nightmares that S.H.I.E.L.D. continued to have samples of Loki on file, especially with some of the shit that had happened in the past year.

By the time Tony finished up (not excepting the transfer of generous rewards into appropriate accounts), he was shaking, secretly soaked with sweat, but he still strolled out, chatting and laughing with his new good friends, to where Hap had the car running at the curb.

His new son lay fast asleep in the back, looking angelic despite all that wild hair, his hands relaxed and open, as if, asleep, he dreamed of how to be a boy again.

Tony slid into the shotgun seat, waved a cheery farewell, then, as Happy started off, ran his own fingers back through his hair. “Fuck, what a day! I’m exhausted.”

“But are you okay, boss?” Happy shot him one of his gloomy-cow looks.

“Eh. I’ll live. I feel a little gross, but I’ll live. How’s our Chicago streaker?”

“He seems like a sweet kid. Kinda young for his age, but super-sweet. I’ll bet he gets along great with Fenrir.”

Tony thought of saying, “Well, he has been a horse all his life,” but thought better of it. He just didn’t have the energy to explain. He settled for, “You hear any news while I was off bullshitting?”

“Not much of it’s good, boss. You want to hear bad, worse, or weird?”

“Aw, hell. Let’s say weird.” Tony took the bottle of cold water Happy passed him, treating himself to a long, long swig, then pressing the cool bottle to his throbbing forehead.

“Kiddo there says Hela and—get this—Dr. Boss sent him down from Asgard, post haste, therefore naked, confused, and in the wrong city. I gather things are going down up there. ‘The palace is full of deaths,’ Sleipnir said.”

“'Deaths' as in my new son has grammar issues, or ' _Deaths_ ' as in my sweet Hela’s holding a sorority party upstairs in the Golden City?”

Happy shrugged. “Couldn’t say. Wanna know what makes that weird?”

“No. No, not really,” Tony said. Then, “The presence of my darling husband? Loki wouldn’t go to Asgard, not with the Assfather still in command. Physically, he just isn’t up to it, and he’d never risk the baby. Emotionally, even for Hela, or Sleipnir? It would be crazy hard on him."

"I couldn’t say," Happy repeated.

Tony drank more water. It tasted fantastic. "Okay, how about we move on to the bad news?”

“The good thing is, no civilians, staff, or Avengers got hurt. The boys got plenty scared, but they’re fine, playing with Director Coulson’s big dog at his place, with Mr. Barton looking after them. Also, the tower is fully structurally sound. Ms. Potts has already sent a crew in to start repairs on the penthouse and also alerted Mr. Pierre that his services will be needed. He suggests we pick up some good quality ready-to-wear suits that he can alter quickly for you, and then he’ll begin a bespoke wardrobe. He’s already working on some things for Dr. Boss, because of the baby. Mr. Howlett took care of some essentials for the boys, and asked if you’d like them to stay at Salem Center, until…”

“Until,” Tony said flatly. “So the bad news was that the penthouse is toast?”

Happy nodded miserably. He looked like a basset hound with conjunctivitis.

“Were any of the ‘bots in the penthouse? No, wait...” Tony answered his own question by tapping a few buttons on his phone. “Nope. All fine and charging happily at their workshop stations. What about Loki’s art?”

“Fortunately, most of what isn’t hung at the Oakhurst had already been moved out to his new studio at the bookshop. And Mr. Howlett says Mr. Friggason--Mr. Thor--is already showing signs of waking up. He’s exhausted tired and confused, but Dr. McCoy thinks he’ll be fine.”

“So everyone’s great but the elephant in the room, which in this case, I surmise, is what’s happening with my husband?”

“Everyone says what a great thing he did, Boss, what a beautiful thing. How he not only saved his brother, he saved thousand of lives.”

In the backseat, Sleipnir softly, miserably, called out, “ _Pabbi_?”

Tony’s uncontrollably-shaking fingers had already started to dial the infirmary.

* * *

Hela never thought of herself as a person who cried, under ordinary circumstances. She wasn’t unfeeling, by any means (or so she hoped), but she tended more toward the level-headed and practical. Like her Dad, her mind flew first to, _How do I fix this?_ rather than lingering on feelings or their meaning.

She considered herself a designer, an inventor, a draughtsperson, not an artist like her _Pabbi_.

Still, Hela wept when she left Jötunnheimr, her entire soul crying out toward the grandfather and uncles she’d never known she possessed, yet who, after one night only of conversation, were already such a part of her being. She missed Helblindi’s sweetness—so much like _Pabbi’s!_ —Byleistr’s raw, almost mad, courage (also quite reminiscent of _Pabbi_ ), Laufey’s cleverness and sardonic wit, tempered by a nobility and strength she found easy to admire. He loved his people, truly loved them, suffered for them, gave all he had to better their lives.

He’d held her hand, huge fingers wrapped around small ones, icy tears on his cheeks, as the winds of his world quieted, the ice and snow pulled back from the traditional grazing lands, the hardy evergreens again pushed upward out of barren stumps, the reindeer-like beasts sprouted out of the fields and the seas once more teemed with fish.

“My Realm,” he’d said softly, in his deep, rumbling voice, and Hela had never known two words to hold more meaning. She loved him, in that moment, and that was that.

Now The Violent Death of Gods unfastened the little skull buttons on her left opera glove, drew it off and tucked it into her belt. Her fingers, long, cool and a little bony, wrapped around Hela’s small hand.

Hela hadn’t felt a bare palm against her bare palm for years, not since she'd been nearly too young to remember. That the sensation had stuck in her memory at all was probably due only to it having been the touch of Uncle Kurt’s hand she recalled--a loving touch, but strange compared to how an ordinary human hand might feel against her skin.

The Death of Kings removed her right gauntlet and shoved it in her pocket before taking Hela’s other hand. Hers was plump and warm, with a broad palm and stubby fingers, much like Uncle Bruce’s. Beneath her highwayman’s attire, she was a large-boned and buxom Death, as somehow seemed to suit her cheerful nature.

Hela squeezed their hands in return. She appreciated her sisters kindness, always. They had no hidden motives, no agenda. She loved them, and no words needed to be said.

The Deaths made the Rainbow Bridge move more quickly this time. There were things to be done. Things to be done soon, without more delay.

A little down the road, she spied her _Pabbi_ , sitting in a chair off to the side of the rainbow with one long, slender leg crossed over the other. Such an ordinary chair he'd conjured, wood-and-chrome like the ones in the Stark Industries third floor breakroom, that Hela laughed as she ran to him, flinging her arms around her _Pabbi's_ chest, even though she knew it wasn’t him, not really.

Or, it was him, but not his body.

Not his real body, anyway, anymore than it had been Laufey's real body her _Pabbi_ had slain in his scorching moment of fury and betrayal.

Hela could scarcely imagine such violence from her _Pabbi_ , who among his family never failed to show gentleness.

“Her Majesty says she will join us later, for the interesting bits,” _Pabbi_ told her, smiling his fully-delighted smile, his green eyes sparkling.

“Oh, how I’ve missed you!” Hela cried. “I have so much to tell! What are you reading?”

_Pabbi_ showed her the cover of his book, which was a slim-green-bound volume with an intricate gold Art Nouveau design embossed upon it.

“Yeats? If it’s ‘ _The Second Coming_ ,’ I must most definitely scold you." Hela sniffed. "It’s terribly overused, _Pabbi_.”

He laughed delightedly. "Oh, how I have missed you, my sweet Hela!. And it is not ' _The Second Coming_ ,' on which, though it is truly a powerfully-scribed poem, I fear I must agree with you. Rather, it is this:

_Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,_  
_Enwrought with golden and silver light,_  
_The blue and the dim and the dark cloths_  
_Of night and light and the half light,_  
_I would spread the cloths under your feet..._

“Perhaps also overused, but so sweet, Hela. So sweet.”

“You are also sweet,” she responded. “You are adorable,” and quoted back at him:

_But I, being poor, have only my dreams;_  
_I have spread my dreams under your feet;_  
_Tread softly because you tread on my dreams._

“Except I’m not exactly poor,” Hela said.

“Not exactly,” her _Pabbi_ echoed, with a quiet laugh, then looked at her gravely. “What will you do now, my darling? Have you thought?”

“I’ve thought almost too much,” Hela admitted. “Free Sleipnir, that’s a given. Free him quickly, before the Allfucker knows.”

Her _Pabbi_ gave a thoughtful nod. “There is a bit of a to-do with your Uncle Thor back home. We might best send Sleipnir to your Dad in Chicago, where he currently visits, and where Happy, our friend and his, attends him.”

“Chicago it is, then,” Hela agreed.

“And after?” His eyes held sorrow and a deep apprehension, and Hela had to remind herself that for centuries, despite terror, rejection, hurt and outright torture, _Pabbi_ had loved the old monster, Odin.

Loved him, tried to please him, ached for his affection, year after year after painful year.

“My poor dear,” Hela told him, kissing her _Pabbi’s_ cheek, then his brow. “You know I’m not like you. I’m not about sparkle and mischief, which isn't something I say as a judgment, for you know I love you best in all the Realms. I’m about a definite means to quite an emphatic ending. The tyrant won’t end up in a bathroom with dull books and porridge, _Pabbi_. You’ve always known he won’t.”

“Yes,” he said, in a broken and beaten-down voice that lacked every bit of the music his usual voice contained. “I know.”

“I won’t stop,” Hela informed him. “Not even for you, my equally-darling _Pabbi_ .”

“I know,” he said again. “I would never ask you to do so, sweetness. For all my qualms, I know what must be, and I _will_ help you accomplish all we have planned.”

_Pabbi_ rose as her Sisters--who'd held back when they first spoke--approached them, taking their gloved hands in turn, bowing low over each with a murmured, “My Lady. My Lady.”

“Allow me to present,” Hela said, in her best formal voice, “The Violent Death of Gods. The Death of Kings. Dearest Sisters, my _Pabbi_ , Loki Laufeyson.”


	17. The Circle Game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony has feelings. Sleipnir is a quick learner. Outside Asgard, there may be a slight change of plans...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> May I designate a no troll zone? Because I am so frickin' sick of trolls I can barely restrain myself from using multiple exclamation points. That's dire. 
> 
> That being said, thank you to everyone else for your kudos and insightful comments. They make my day!
> 
> Masterpiece Theater is a portfolio program on American public television for the airing of (mostly) British imports, such as Downton Abbey, or the many mini-series based on Dickens novels.
> 
> "Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent" was one of the tag lines from the TV show _Dragnet_ , a cop show starring Jack Webb that ran from 1951-1959 (in black-and-white) and 1967-1970) in color. If Tony ever decides to say, "Just the facts, Ma'am. Nuthin' but the facts," that's from the same series.
> 
> In Greek Mythology, Nemesis is the goddess of retribution. Her name in Greek, νέμειν ( _némein_ ), means “to give what is due.”
> 
> The "Great Dance," in this case would be life, especially keeping in mind that many ancient and current folk dances are circle dances.

* * *

Director lived in pretty much exactly the kind of place where you’d expect him to live (during the times, that was, when he wasn't thoroughly ensconced at Clint's)—in a classic older building, very well-maintained, with a friendly, helpful doorman of the kind who wore fine-looking, slightly old-fashioned livery and greeted not only guests but semi-frequent visitors by name. He greeted Tony by name and managed to make it sound like it was because he’d often come by in the past, not because he was Tony Stark and anyone who hadn’t been living in a cave for the past twenty years knew exactly who he was.

“Go right on up, Mr. Stark,” the doorman said, smiling. He was a big, handsome dude who looked like he might have played some college football in earlier years. “Mr. Coulson and Mr. Barton are expecting you.”

“Thank you, Alphonse,” Tony answered, with totally fake cheer—gods, he was stressed, and his only motivation for being at Phil’s place right now, instead of glued to his husband’s side at the tower, was the knowledge that once Loki regained consciousness, he'd totally rip him a new one (in the most elegant and loving possible way) if he found out Tony hadn't made checking on the boys his absolute priority.

This, despite knowing for a fact that he’d find his sons 100% okay, with Jöri mother-henning Fen, both boys rampaging through the apartment with Phil’s dogasaurus, and Clint slipping all three of them junk food every time his boyfriend’s back was turned.

Loki on the other hand…

Hank hadn't told him much more than that his husband was unconscious, but the baby didn't seem to have been affected--which, translated from BeastSpeak, meant that, yes, the baby actually _was_ fine but Tony should be worried as fuck about Loki. He’d long since detected the inverse ratio between how dramatic _Big Blue_ got and how much _he_ should freak out about what Hank was telling him. With McCoy saying nothing at all…

Kurt not saying anything either, made all that silence seem dire.

Bruce, under pressure, mumbled a vague something about Loki's level of brain activity being "troubling."

When pressed, he'd added, in a slightly less mumbley way, "Loki was down a really long time, Tone. I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

Tony had been too scared to ask more. Denial, after all, wasn't just a big river in Africa.

Christ, he wanted to be there, not here.

Meanwhile, here he stood, making nice with the doorman.

Sleipnir gave a soft little whimper, and it hit Tony that if the boy was anything like as sensitive as the other children, he’d probably just been mentally puking raw, unfiltered, scary emotion all over the poor kid.

He gave Sleipnir’s hand a little reassuring squeeze, hoping he understood. The undoubtedly confused boy had glommed on to him like a shipwrecked sailor clinging to a life ring in high seas, peering around Tony’s shoulder with his one non-swollen eye wide as a saucer.

“My new son Sleipnir, Alphonse,” Tony said, smiling. “Fresh off the plane from Iceland. Bet you that a month from now he’ll be rapping along to the radio and his English will be better than mine is.”

And, knock him down with a feather if Sleip didn’t reach out his fully-extended right hand, perform a genteel little bow, and Masterpiece Theater at the doorman, “I am Sleipnir Stark. I am very pleased to meet you, Mr. Alphonse”--and double-damned if he didn’t also possess a posh British accent, which brought the Stark household score to Crass American-1, Masterpiece Theater-5.

As Tony attempted not to let his jaw drop to his chest, Alphonse grinned. “Aren’t you a polite young man, Sleipnir! I should have you give my boy some lessons.”

Walking across the lobby with his newly acquired stepson, it occurred to Tony that Sleip had started playing with his spare StarkPad in the backseat on the trip up, managing not only to get it running but to find a movie to stream and have it playing within the first five minutes.

A movie that contained those exact same words, with only the names changed to protect the innocent.

And the Assfather had kept this sweet, brilliant, sensitive kid as his fucking horse—his goddamn _horse_ \--for how many centuries?

Item nine million on Tony’s personal _“So you think you can’t hate Odin more?”_ list.

“ _Sjáum við vini_ ,” Tony said (“We see friends”) as they waited for the elevator, which was either toddler or caveman _Ӕs_ , but he was honestly too tired and too strung out to go searching through his admittedly limited vocabulary for better grammar.

Sleipnir didn’t like the rumble and grind of the elevator one bit, and practically pasted himself to Tony’s back in his fear. The poor kid looked like he was going into full-on freak-out mode—hell, he’d probably never in his life been inside a building that wasn’t a goddamn stable, much less seen an elevator.

To the previous nine million, add one.

This boy was Odin’s grandson. His fucking grandson. How goddamn much of an asshole did the King of Asgard have to be, to give this kid the life he’d given him?

Answer? Look at the life he’d given Loki, his son. Insane didn’t even begin to cover it.

And eight legs? Why the fuck eight legs? Because the horse he plunked his kingly ass onto had to be extra specially special?

What a clown.

Tony put an arm around the boy’s shoulders, pulling him right up close, glad to find Sleipnir as receptive to affection as any of the Lokettes, Sherlock excepted.

“Honey, it’s okay. Really,” he said, hoping the kid would be reassured by his tone of voice, even if he couldn’t understand a word. “It’s just a machine, a noisy machine, and machines are really cool. Your brothers and I will teach you all about them.”

“Cool,” Sleipnir answered, his voice whisper-soft. “Brothers?”

Sleipnir touched his own throat, an expression suddenly coming over his face that could only be absolute joy and wonder.

“Brothers? Fen? Jöri?” His hand hovered for a moment in the air, just as slender, elegant and long-fingered as Loki’s. In fact, whatever his jerkwad father had looked like, whatever he’d been, there wasn’t _anything_ about this kid that wasn’t purely, unadulteratedly, beautifully Loki.

At last he laid the palm flat over Tony’s heart, gazing up at him with that big, green, emotion-filled eye. The touch felt cool, sweetly cool, the same exact temperature as Loki's skin when he felt well and happy.

“Daddy?” Sleipnir asked, his young voice brimming with anxiety and hope, “Me?”

The heart of Tony Stark, engineer and cynic, melted faster than a box of crayons left on a boiling-hot radiator. He couldn’t help himself. Already, in his thoroughly-melted heart, Sleipnir Lokison Stark had become his son, and he loved the boy beyond reason.

* * *

After they unwove the fabric of the universe to allow Sleipnir passage, Loki could only lean for a time, unspeaking, against the back of the stall, his face pressed to the rough boards.

Hela rested her head against his back, slipping her small slender arms round his waist, but he found himself unable to talk, even to her, one of the two beings who understood his heart best in all the Realms.

All around them, the many Deaths waited in polite silence.

“Sleipnir understood, _Pabbi_ ,” Hela told him in gentle tones. “He knew you kept distant only to protect him, that you love him dearly, as you love us all. That if you had be seen to give him favour, the Allfucker only would have hurt him in worse ways.”

“Your Dad has perhaps afflicted you with Potty Mouth, dearest Hela,” Loki answered at last, with a sigh.

“Sometimes we laugh so we don’t cry,” his daughter responded, which Loki understood as the truest of true things. “I really don’t mean to rush you, _Pabbi_ , but are you nearly ready? It’s just that my Sisters are waiting.”

“I am prepared, _hjarta minn_ ,” Loki answered, gazing down into her great green eyes, brushing the soft, white curve of her cheek with his thumb, thinking of the other, much older Hela, who had not been born as she was now, but became thus with the weary years piled upon her.

Queen Hela bore a second name in _Æs_ , the name _Hefnd._  The ancient Greeks, whose language Loki taught to his students of NYU, would have known her as Nemesis.

The Great Wolf Fenrir gobbled up the sun and the moon. The cycle ticked like a clock toward its turning. Queen Hela brought death to her many _Aesir_ foes, and those deaths had not been gentle blessings. She had never been an unkind ruler to the subjects of her Dismal Realm, but to the slayers of her brothers, and of the Loki who had been her parent, her vengeance had been both vicious and complete. When the new cycle rose from the ashes of the old, of all that had once lived, only Hela remained.

For cycle after cycle now, Queen Hela reigned, waiting, in her misty realm, for those who had left the Great Dance to join it once again.

In the divers times they conversed, Queen Hela never spoke of her own _Pabbi (or mother, perhaps, or father)._ Had that Loki been _Æs_? _Jötunn_? Half- _Jötunn_ , like himself? He had never known.

Between they two, Loki supposed, some words ought never to be said. He was not those who came before, and must follow his singular path until his own Dance ended.

He understood only that Queen Hela had loved that other Loki, her parent, deeply and truly, whether he had been a "wicked" god, or a "good" one, whether his deeds indeed brought the ruin of that cycle’s Asgard, or the deeds of another who gave him the blame.

Loki knew also that the queen had loved her brothers (her Jöri, and her Fen) with all the love she had to give, and that none of them had been monsters, not in the beginning.

At the end, they had become what time, and their world, had made of them.

“'We defy augury',” Loki breathed.

“This is no time for _Hamlet, Pabbi_ ,” Hela answered crisply, perhaps even a bit crossly, in what Tony was wont to call her “bossy-girl voice.”

Loki bent, kissing his daughter’s brow with all tenderness, wishing with all his sorrow-filled heart that he might follow her now, though he knew it must not be.

“How I love you, my beauteous one, my own sweet Hela,” he said, and in the next instant ripped open a doorway in the fabric of the universe.

He shoved her, hard, through the portal, just as far and fast as he possibly could.

Unlike him, she would not fall. Not into shadows. Not into despair. Not into the thrall of terrible beings who meant her only ill.

Loki thought of valiant Natasha, and of her Red Ledger, dripping with the blood she had spilled. The hands of his bright, brave, ferocious Hela should never be stained red. Never. Not his dear girl.

Loki would fight to prevent that fate unto his very last breath.

One by one, the silent Deaths, even The Violent Death of Gods, faded from view, until only The Death of Kings remained, swinging idly, back and forth, atop the door of Sleipnir’s former stall.

“Well, that was… unexpected,” she said. “I now assume Hela was allowed to come here as a ruse, that she thought she was playing Odin, and he thought he was playing her, while behind it all, the god of mischief moved the pieces of the Long Game all for himself?"

"Not for myself."Loki leaned his head once more against the splintery wall. “Hela is my daughter, my Blessed Death, my shining light. She is meant only to be a guide, not a taker of life.”

The Death of Kings regarded him a long while. “You’re not like the other Lokis, you know.”

“I am exactly like the other Lokis,” he answered, feeling, despite his shining-new, if temporary, body, weary, desperate, afraid. “We always love our children beyond reason.”

Tony, oh my Tony, Loki thought, and wanted to weep, though he did not.

“In the interest of full disclosure,” said The Death of Kings, “I feel I should state…”

“Yes,” Loki answered.

“You are the rightful heir to Asgard’s throne. If you remove the old man…”

“Yes,” Loki repeated.

“You become subject to me. I thought I should remind you.”

“It is quite all right,” Loki told her. “Come along with me. If the time arrives for you to perform your duty, then I pray you do so as you please.”

He tilted his chin, meeting her kind brown eyes with his level gaze. “It matters not to me.”

“I’ll take no pleasure in the task,” said The Death of Kings. “I wanted you to know that. And you’re nothing like the others. Honestly, Loki, don’t sell yourself short.”

She paused, studying his face in turn. “You poor, brave, mad boy. You know what will become of you if you don’t succeed in this lunacy?”

“I will cease to be yours,” Loki answered quietly.

Yes, he knew, and when his once-and-never father had finished with him, when he became broken until he could not break more, then perhaps his sweet child would return for him, and he would kiss her a last time.

Then his Hela would open a door, and he would walk away from this Realm, and into the world where her namesake reigned, to become her shadow-subject until his Dance began again.”

“Gods, you folks are fatalistic!” The Death of Kings exclaimed. “You should try living in a warmer climate. I hear Hawai’i’s nice this time of year.”

“Only if I intended to fail,” Loki answered, feeling his grin flash sharp and bright as Thor’s lightning, “Which I emphatically do not, dear Death of Kings.”

“Bess,” she said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Bess. Is my name. I thought you ought to know it.”

“Then will you do me the honour of being my companion, and my witness, Much-Esteemed Lady Bess, The Death of Kings?”

"I would be honoured,” she answered, then frowned and shook her head ruefully. “As a favour to me, though, I ask that you don’t screw this up, my dear boy. Promise me you have things covered. Assure me that even your plans have plans.”

“Even my plans have plans,” Loki told her, most earnestly and sincerely, as if butter would not melt in his mouth, as Tony might say. Or was it “butter would melt?” None of his husband’s Midgardian expressions made the least amount of sense. What had the melting (or not) of butter to do with anything?

Foolish, clever, lovely, beloved Tony. Loki would give up willingly the last hours of his life, just look one time upon his husband’s face, just to share one kiss with him.

Oh, but he would succeed. He would. He had brought his brother back from madness and despair, and he would not fail here.

“Not only do my plans have plans,” he said, and grinned again, in that way Tony would name "charming as fuck," “The plans of my plans are astoundingly clever. You are bound to be truly impressed by them.”

Loki reached out his hand for the elegantly-gauntleted hand of The Death of Kings. The fabric of the universe unwove again, folding back to reveal the weed-choked remnants of what had once been Frigga’s splendid garden, where the bees had ever hummed and the flowers with their sweet scents ever bloomed, but now rank and silent, as if mourning she who once tended them.

Even the bench where Loki himself had once lain as a young, shamed boy and wept hopeless tears (Narfi and Vali small flickerings of life within his belly), had cracked and greyed.

In that moment, Loki missed Frigga with a pain beyond pain.

On that bench Loki’s once-and-never-father now slumped all on his own, in his eye-patch and useless armour and over-resplendent robes, a fat, half-blind toad squatting in wait to catch still more flies.

_But you will not catch **me** , old man,_ Loki thought

If he had once (as Phil Coulson opined, what now seemed a thousand years in his past), “lacked conviction,” Loki lacked not the least drop of conviction now.

With the hand of The Death of Kings held warmly within his hand, Loki stepped through the divide, and into Asgard.


	18. Into the Woods

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The beginning of the end for a cruel old god.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm figuratively biting my nails, as this may all seem a bit different from what was expected. The gods know I struggled with how to finish Odin off, especially considering that he's a wily old bastard and had to know Loki would eventually get completely fed up with his crap. Keeping in mind Loki's nature as a god of fire, lies (or storytelling) and mischief, this is what came to me. I hope it doesn't disappoint!
> 
> Ignaas, Mirjam, Hanne and Amsing are actually Dutch names, as any readers from the Netherlands will no doubt recognize. I wanted names that sounded fairytalesque without being overtly German or Scandinavian. _Ignaas_ means fire, by the way.
> 
> There's a folkloric reason, in Tolkien, that Frodo sails "Into the West" to escape the pains of Midgard... er... Middle Earth, and why Mordor is in the east. I'm sure the good Professor was very well aware of the western tradition (in Medieval literature, folk songs, folktales and fairy tales, etc.) that the west is the direction of home, safety, goodness, while the east stands for mystery, danger, evil.
> 
> I now know more than I ever thought I would about the pests and parasites that trouble ash trees (remembering that Yggdrasil is also said to be an ash, and the name of the first man in Norse mythology is _Askr_ \--"Ash Tree"). Gall is a parasitic plant that grows on ash trees, canker affects the branches and trunk, the ash bud moth drills into new leaf buds and the emerald ash borer is an iridescent beetle that bores tunnels through the bark and into the tree itself. Now imagine a tree that feels as a person feels while all that is going on...
> 
> The _Einherjar_ =Odin's guards 
> 
> "Geas" is actually an Irish term. It means something a person is either forced to do or  
> prohibited from doing by magic and, as it does in this chapter, it can carry the weight of a curse.
> 
> "On that night the boy wore his wolf suit and made mischief of one kind and another" is a slight paraphrasing of the line from _Where the Wild Things Are_ , by Maurice Sendak.

* * *

Once upon a time, a woodcutter lived with his wife in a cottage on the edge of a great wood where the trees grew high. His name was Ignaas, and he was not a rich man, but also was he far from poor, as woodcutters go, for he was strong of arm and sharp of wit, and possessed the dear love of a wise, kind and thrifty woman, who was called Mirjam.

They bore along well together, as if they carried but one heart between them, and their only sorrow was that they had, from their love, produced no child.

One day soon after the melting of the snows, as soon as light came down to the world, Ignaas took his dinner pail and his strong brown horse, Hanne, loaded his saws and axes onto his sledge, and ambled out of the cleared lands and into the forest itself, with an aim to pursue his livelihood, as he did on every day except for the Day of Rest.

At times Ignaas made his way north into the forest, and at other times west, but on this day he made his way east, though he knew not why, for it was said all things of evil come from the direction. Yet east he made his way.

For nearly an hour in he traveled, always wondering at his own reasons, for the roads—what roads there were—had aged and become overgrown, and though Ignaas might make his way easily enough, Hanne, and the sledge the horse drew, found their path difficult indeed. Still, he found no tree that seemed worthy of his ax-blade, and deeper into the forest he continued.

As he went, Ignaas spoke to himself sternly, telling himself he ought to turn back, that he had long since passed many trees good for cutting, and even should he find a tree now, what would be the purpose of making his good horse haul a load such a great distance?

Turn back he almost did, obeying what he knew to be his own wise counsel, but then he saw the clearing, and in the clearing a broad ash tree with wide-stretching branches winter-barren of leaves.

Ignaas was a calm man of practical thought, not empty of fancy, yet not often carried away by the wilder workings of imagination. Still, it came to him that the branches resembled reaching arms, and that within the lumps and cracks, the gall and canker, that scarred the ash tree’s bark, lay the face of an old man—and that the face was one of such evil it left him speechless and filled with fear.

Ignaas had known always a great love for the forest, his second home, and a respect for the creatures that dwelt therein, and never before had he felt troubled walking its ways. The sharp ax seemed to leap into his hand, as the thought leapt into Ignaas’s head (which had contained no violent thought, ever, in all his life), _I must kill this terrible thing! I must kill it!_

But still he stood, and stared, and could not move, for terror coiled tight and tighter in his belly, though Ignaas had never known fear for anything, excepting the untimely loss of his dear wife Mirjam, without whom his heart could not beat.

“Think of what you felt in that moment,” said a low voice, just a little to the left of him, with a pleasant yet outlandish accent. Ignaas might have listened to that voice for a year at a time, and never have tired of hearing it. “Think, and do not hesitate, for this tree is indeed an evil thing, and the Realms are better rid of its presence.”

Ignaas looked, and saw that a man clad in black and green sat upon the ground, as if he had remained in that one place for ages of time, watching with his great green eyes, that appeared both sad and merry, and waiting with a patience Ignaas (who was a lively young man), might never have mustered.

The man’s back leaned against the bole of an equally old, yet far more ordinary tree, the sight of it, after viewing the awful ash, like the sight of a dear old friend.

“Why did you not cut it down?” Ignaas asked, bubbling with curiosity. He rarely saw another soul within the wood, and never a stranger.

“Because I am not a woodcutter,” the stranger replied, reasonably, with a smile that was a little sly, yet also filled with kindness.

Ignaas liked the man at once, and trusted him immediately, though he could not have said why that was--only that, though his face appeared full of mischief, he seemed meant to be liked and trusted, and Ignaas, who was in general a good judge of men, did trust that the stranger meant no ill to him.

He took a seat on the soft moss beside the man, to watch and listen with him, though a stern voice within his head reminded him, _Watching and listening cuts no trees, Ignaas Amsing._

After some time had passed, the stranger asked, “What do you call them, those narrow insects, the length of my thumbnail and glistening like jewels?” He held up his thumb to demonstrate the length of which he spoke.

His hands were exquisite, and Ignaas, who was clever with his own hands, and often of an evening carved useful, delightful or pleasing things (either to sell in the town or for the joy of his sweet Mirjam), wished with his whole heart he might someday whittle by his skill something equally lovely.

“They are called emerald ash borers, sir,” Ignaas answered readily, for he was not an ignorant man, but knew much of the ways of forests. “They will kill an ash tree, given time.”

“I have listened to the ground-squirrels gnaw upon his roots, and seen the bud-moths drill into the new buds that might have his leaves,” said the stranger thoughtfully. “When I felt the droves of those you name ‘emerald ash borers’ approach, my heart leaped with hope as they dived and burrowed beneath his skin, and as they drilled crooked tunnels through his crooked heart again and again. And yet, man of the forest, they do not proceed.

“They do not end him!” the stranger cried out, as if despairing. “Oh, why do they not end him?”

“They will.” Ignaas’s heart smote him. He wished he might give better cheer. “A thin, young tree might die in a year. Such an old man as this…”

Almost timidly, though he was not a timid man by any means, he reached out, allowing his hand to alight at last upon the other man’s shoulder. 

"Such tough old gentlemen require patience and time, good sir.”

“I may not cut him and end it all,” the stranger said, “And while I hear his shrieks at the predations of the insects and the creatures of the wood, I also hear his cruel, cold voice in my head. It must end. It _must_ end. I miss my family. Time passes not for them, yet passes heavily for me. Again and again, I wonder, would Hela’s way have been better than mine has been?”

“Is this Hela you speak of a god, as you are, sir?” Ignaas did not know where the words had come from—yet they came.

Again the stranger gave his sad and merry smile, turning upon Ignaas for the first time the full weight of his attention.

“Is that what you call me? I suppose I might be, by your lights. The subject is open to debate.” He pushed the curling black hair back from his face and bound it behind his head. “Hela is my little girl, my daughter. She is kind, and wise beyond her years, and also sometimes very naughty and stubborn. I suppose you might well call her a goddess, for it is she who makes a door between life and death for those in great suffering, and conveys them on their way.”

“And this wicked tree?” Ignaas found himself asking.

“Was once a god also, and before I changed him into this form, he ruled over a land far, far from this place, and went by the name of Odin.”

The name fell upon the woodcutter’s ears like the drop of a loved one’s coffin into the cold of the grave. He shuddered.

The god, in turn, set one perfect hand upon Ignaas’s knee, looking deeply and more deeply into the young man’s eyes, as if, at length, he came to taste every drop of his being.

“You will do. You will do very well,” the stranger said after some time had passed. “You are a good man, an honest and a strong man, Ignaas Amsing. You are like Kurt. If I am mindful in my guarding of you, he will not be able to bring you harm. Take hold of your ax now, and swing, woodcutter, and as you cut I will tell you a story of olden times.”

Ignaas greatly enjoyed stories, whether merry or sad. A story would pass the sometimes-dreary time of chopping delightfully, and a story told in the reluctant god’s wonderful voice…

The woodcutter swung his ax, and it seemed, with that first stroke, the gnarled old ash screamed—yet the sound was only the noise of flocks upon flocks of startled birds, giving voice as they rose up out of the forest.

“Once upon a time,” began the story (for it seemed even gods knew the proper ways of beginning such things), “In a time of bitter war, an infant prince was stolen from his home…”

* * *

“So,” Odin spat. “It is to be you who slays me, and not your deceitful bitch-daughter, is it? My stolen, useless _, ergi_ son.”

With a gesture, Loki summoned a chair for himself, and sat, legs crossed.

It was a lovely chair, of a golden-brown wood and a style indicative of the English Arts and Crafts Movement once spearheaded by Mr. William Morris. Into the arms and back were carved remarkably realistic oak leaves.

“What thoughts are in your head, foolish boy?” Odin asked. “As ever, I make no sense of them.”

Might he be allowed such chairs when the penthouse was redone? Much as he adored his husband, Tony’s choices in such matters veered between Spartan and expensive-yet-somehow-tacky (he had recently learnt the word from Kitty Pryde, and found that, in addition to also meaning “sticky,” the definition he knew, it might also mean “appearing cheap, or of questionable taste,” and might be varied by the addendum "ticky-tacky").

Tony also, in his former furnishings, had included touches of the worst of mid-century design.

There was a surfeit, as well, of one shade of brown that Loki found unpleasant in the extreme.

A rich green on the walls of the common area would be lovely. His green, in a paint of excellent quality, thicker than double cream.

He considered such thoughts to still the ever-present fear within his mind, and to quiet the urge to bow down before this corrupt old god, as he had done so many times.

Loki’s heart knew the truth: he owed his grandfather no such obeisance.

“I am thinking of this elegant chair upon which I sit,” he said to Odin, speaking as off-handedly as he could possibly speak, as if he had not a care for anything in this Realm of Asgard, or any other.

“And also of my home in Midgard, and that I was never your stolen son, but your grandson-by-blood, and that you most cruelly plotted the death of my good father, Hodr, your heir and firstborn son, in favor of Baldr, who flattered and hated you, as we all do, you vain old man. And I am thinking of how I slew your favorite, not very long past, and that I shall soon slay you.

"I think also of how your _Einherjar_ sleep beyond waking within your Golden Hall, and of how my friend Bess, The Death of Kings, has opened windows and doors you cannot see, so that all of Asgard, now freed from your enthrallment, may watch and listen.”

Odin answered, icy-voiced (in his tone, Loki heard an echo of those life-destroying words, _No, Loki_ ), “Do you believe I care?”

Loki leaned back in his chair, re-crossing his legs and regarding the cruel old man he had called father for so many long years, the evil god who had injured him constantly and terribly. “Worry you not that I shall return to rule in your place. I would not take your throne now…” he smiled slightly, thinking of something Tony might say, “For your blessing and a bag of crisps. Thor, the one you deigned to nearly love, will not return either. Like me, he has grown enamored of Midgard, and, like me, will not come back to this place. His discovery of your treachery and falsehood nearly slew him, and would have done, had I not come to his rescue, in company with those who love him truly.

“We have put down strong roots in our new Realm, Father of None—and so I call you, for not only do your people know themselves betrayed, but now you have no sons to call your own, and no grandsons. Two of your sweet great-grandsons you consider monsters. One you enthralled and made your steed.” Loki smiled, considering. “Even I, so wronged by Asgard, would not wish Sherlock upon you—and he would doubtless find the place, and you, both illogical and stupid, telling you so in no uncertain terms. Only Hela remains.”

Loki bent toward the old man again. “Do you understand that she is Death, disrespected Grandfather, and came with many Deaths tucked into her wings? Her dearest friend is The Death of Kings, and she calls by the name of ‘Grandmother’ The Violent Death of Gods. She is not my equal in sorcery—as yet—but she is, in all ways, a fell being of great mystery.”

Loki reached into the air beside him, where he had located the most useful of his pocket universes, the one he used exclusively for the keeping safe of precious or dangerous things.

In this place he kept his scepter—the original, not the nearly-worthless duplicate currently enshrined by the repugnant Baron Wolfgang von Strucker of infamous Hydra. That scepter would appear as real to all the Baron’s testings. It might even, perhaps, power one or two of his more useless machines.

Only on the day the revolting von Strucker chose to wield it would he discover a pair of quite interesting things. The scepter he owned would not issue forth waves of blue energy. Neither would it control hearts or minds.

What it would do, should he attempt to use it thus—no doubt to the Baron’s great astonishment—was release an attractive pennant of black silk, inscribed with golden runic letters that spelled out the word, “BANG!”

Loki had been viewing the misadventures of the unfortunate Wile E. Coyote with his children when the idea came to him, and he had laughed aloud.

How he longed (for all the sorrows he'd known there of late) to be home on Midgard with the ones he loved! To laugh with his children, to lie in Tony’s arms, to speak of everything or nothing with his dearest Kurt, or with Thor, his always-brother and, now, friend, to build upon those friendships newly begun.

Loki did not wish (not, at least, with the unconflicted whole of his heart) to kill Odin--not for vengeance, at least, as Queen Hela might have killed him--and yet he did.

For if he did not, who would? The mad old tyrant could not be left to rule, could not be restrained, could not be let to live, any more than a rabid dog could be left to live. If he had been wise once, a true Father of All, if he had once been shrewd, or just, those days were long passed by. He had outlived two lives, even of the _Æsir_ , and now, in truth, he must die.

Odin reached upward with a speed Loki would not have credited, an expanse of gold glittering suddenly in his hand.

In that same moment, quick as flame, Loki withdrew his own hand from the pocket universe, and found Mjolnir indeed flew as truly for him as she ever had for Thor.

The infinitesimal shards of the spear Gungnir drifted over the pathways, the ragged lawns, the flower beds (now weed-choked, but once lovingly tended by the only mother Loki would ever know), like a fall of jagged golden snow.

Odin lurched from his bench with hands outstretched, as if he would throttle Loki where he stood. In that instant Loki was not there, but behind the old man, his once-and-never-father, his arm hooked tight, but not chokingly tight around the mad god's neck, as his own heart pounded against his ribs.

“You cannot kill me!” Odin raged, spittle flying from his lips. “You cannot, Loki, unless you would give birth to your own doom! On the day you were born, I cast over you a geas for my own protection, that you might neither cut my flesh, nor draw my blood, nor stop the heart from beating in my breast, without bringing down upon yourself and your line crueler punishments than any I might devise.”

“Oh, Grandfather…” Loki sighed, calling Mjolnir back to his hand, looping her tether round his free wrist. “Knowing what I am, how I have studied, all my Craft and all my skill, did you imagine I would not realize? Did you believe I would not make different plans? I will do now what sorcerers are ever said to do: as I change my own form by my will, so I shall, with great ease, transform yours.”

Tightening his arm around Odin’s neck, holding Mjolnir firmly, Loki unwove the warp and the weft of the universe to open a gateway.

Out of Asgard and out of time they flew, until they lighted down in another place entire, a place of stronger magic, and stranger rules.

A forest grew up around them there, just as the forest grew up within Max’s room inside the story (on that night the boy wore his wolf suit and made mischief of one kind and another), until the walls became the world all around him.

The great god Odin, released from Loki’s arm, fell to his knees, letting out a bellow of near-animal fury, his face as red as fire.

Loki stood over him and smiled (a little sadly), for what was, and what might have been. He felt weary, but no fear remained, and no anger, really.

The _seiðr_ rose in him then, green and powerful as spring, its tendrils twining with speed into the might and magic of that land.

“I would have loved you, truly, Grandfather,” Loki murmured. “I would have loved you, if only you had allowed me.”

Odin lurched to his feet, moving as if he intended to grapple with his grandson, to break and subdue and humiliate him, as he had done so many times in the past, never feeling in his rage, how the change began within him.

But he could not move forward by so much as an inch. Roots shot down deep and deeper into the earth, from where his soles and his toes had been.

The old god screamed once, and only once, before his body changed, and grew, and became wooden, a form of leaf, branch and trunk, ever anchored into the earth of that place.


	19. Just Can't Help Lovin' That Man of Mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meanwhile, back on Midgard...
> 
> Princess Hela is not best pleased, Tony is a good dad, and even action heroes get the blues (including a little Kurt/Logan background story).
> 
> p.s. I made a few changes to the previous chapter to improve the clarity of the chapter ending.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title comes from the song " _Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man_ " (music by Jerome Kern, and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II from their 1927 musical _Show Boat_ ).
> 
>  _Go, Dog, Go!_ by P.D. Eastman is a long-time favorite of very young children. Hop on Pop is a similar book by Dr. Suess, also aimed towards the very young.
> 
> The Rosetta Stone was inscribed in 196 BCE with a decree by Ptolemy V, King of Egypt. The decree appears in three scripts: the top text is Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, the middle section is in Demotic script; the lowest part is in Ancient Greek. Because all three texts are basically the same, with only minor differences between them, the stone turned out to be the magic secret decoder ring for our modern understanding of Egyptian hieroglyphs.
> 
> Crispy Critters was a popular unhealthy breakfast cereal when Tony was young. The Critters tended not to stay very crispy, especially with the addition of milk, and were only vaguely animal shaped. They were also cloyingly sweet. The phrase is often used now to something (particularly something once living) burned to an absolute crisp.
> 
> "bamboozle"=to confuse, frustrate or cheat  
> In 17th century slang "bam" could be used as a verb, meaning “to trick" or "to con” or a noun, meaning a con artist or cheat. It's one of those cases in which the verb developed out of the noun.
> 
> Kurt is saying the _Hail Mary_ , in German, text courtesy of the Catholics Worldwide.
> 
> Matthew 6:5-6 contains instructions for Christians not to pray in public because "thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are," but rather in the privacy of their homes, behind closed doors.
> 
> Logan may not know how many of his biological children he has killed, but I do--seven out of eight. They've tended, sadly, to be pretty universally horrible people.
> 
> Loki and I will both loudly call out, "I do what I want!" when it comes to X-Men canon. Events from the first Chris Claremont run, when the new team was introduced, and before the X-Men split off into 90 million books is canon for my purposes. What came after, written by a variety of folks with varying degrees of talent and a bazillion characters I didn't much care about... not so much. I read the latest run when I can and dip into its waters now and then for inspiration, keeping what I want and discarding the rest. Needless to say, in my head, a certain popular mutant isn't dead. And Kurt isn't made of Bamfs, he's still the biological child of the ever-cool (if reprehensible) Mystique and Azazel. Also, what actually happened in canon when the X-Men visited Asgard was fairly... pointless, IMHO. Let's imagine something better, shall we?
> 
> "cattywampus"=not lined up or arranged correctly, "out of whack" (not working right)
> 
>  _Herzchen_ =little heart (German)

* * *

If Tony had expected to find Director’s place in a state of relative peace, and to be able to calmly reunite Sleipnir with Jöri while at the same time introducing him to Fen, he discovered himself sorely, sorely mistaken. Instead, it turned out to be more like entering some kind of supernatural handball court (if the game of handball involved several dozen flying objects), with Director protesting (sounding both as testy and as frantic as Tony had ever heard him), a badly overexcited Anastasia bounding around the room barking her giant, elegant head off, and Phil’s prized possessions whizzing around them in every direction.

Five seconds after flinging open the door to let Tony enter, Clint ducked a hurtling iron—which Fen caught neatly, proving Tony’s theory that he’d grow up to have good hands—and panted, “’bout… uh… effing time, Stark.”

In the center of the room, Hela was literally levitating with anger. As in, a meter off the ground and bobbing in the air like a cork in turbulent water.

Tony made a hasty introduction. “Sleipnir, meet Clint. Clint, this is Sleip, the kids’ big brother from Asgard. Swear to all the gods, Empress, shoes on the floor NOW. And stop throwing shit that's not ours.”

He wasn’t sure it would work, but on this one he had to give himself major dad-props. Hela’s tiny, stylish, shoes hit the floor. So did all the crap in the air. Luckily, none of it broke, to Phil’s no doubt undying relief. He did like his stuff. He still clutched a broom and dustpan to his chest, but most of the stricken expression left his face.

“Apologies,” Tony said. “Can I use your bedroom?”

Director nodded. The boys came to take Sleipnir’s hands. They both knew well enough that when their sister was being a force of nature, it was a job for the grown-ups and time to back the hell off.

Tony shepherded his daughter out of the living area and into the darkened room where Phil and Clint slept, sitting her down on the edge of the perfectly-made bed. He bent to slip off her handmade Asgardian shoes (black, and unnaturally shiny), then rummaged through the dresser drawers for a t-shirt—Clint’s, by the size, in Hela’s favorite inky color.

“Honey, put this on instead of that Asgardian shit. I’m gonna make a brief r. of r. visit, then join you. Gimme a shout when you’re decent, okay?”

Poor Hela nodded miserably. Her nose and her beautiful green eyes had gone a pale shade of crimson, her flawless face flooded with tears.

Like Loki, and unlike every other single sentient being in the universe, she looked even more beautiful when she wept.

She broke Tony’s heart, she really did, and she made him feel deeply, deeply afraid. This was no time, though, for questions, not with his daughter so distraught. He honestly hadn’t known Hela had it in her to get that carried away, by emotion or anything else. She was usually such a rock. Now and then a snarky rock, but still a rock.

He peed more as a way to give his small daughter time, washed his hands, then wet a washcloth with cool water from the tap, emerging when he heard her shaky voice call, “Decent!”

“Oh, sweetheart.” Tony sat beside her on the bed, wiping her flushed, tear-stained face with the cool cloth.

If he hadn’t felt so sad for her distress, he might have laughed at the fact that Clint’s shirt was no longer so much a tee as an exquisitely-fashioned Victorian nightdress made of t-shirt material. He hoped it hadn’t been the archer’s favorite.

Which made him think of the fate of his own favorite t-shirt, which in turn made him feel even sadder.

But Hela didn’t need that. She needed her daddy, and that meant it was time for him to be strong and wise (or do a good job faking it). Time to be the actual grown-up in the family.

“So, Sleip’s home, sweetie. That’s good, huh?”

Hela didn’t answer, just crawled up into his lap, resting her head against his chest. Tony held her, rocked her, sang to her the same songs he’d sung to her when she was so little she could literally fit on the palm of his hand, remembering the question she’d asked him then, about octopi (Loki would sniff and correct him with “octopodes or octopods, please, husband,” and go on about plurals and Greek root words and the like, but he was on his own, so he’d stick to what he was used to) and their marvelous undersea gardens.

Gods, had that only been two years before? Only two years and change, with change being the operative word.

Nothing in his life was the same as it had been. Nothing. Least of all him.

Here he was, Tony Stark, Family Man, with his Childlike Empress, his beautiful daughter, his secret favorite, on his lap. He knew he would love his Hela always, without fail, whether she was a Death, a goddess, or the Queen of Asgard. It was fated, from nearly the moment they met, the moment he first heard her voice inside his head.

“Go to sleep, my darling girl,” Tony said. “It’ll feel better when you wake up again.” He lifted her in his arms and turned back the covers, then settled her on the crisp new sheet and folded the comforter over her again.

“It won’t,” Hela grumbled into the pillow. “It won’t. It won’t.”

“I know it doesn’t seem like it will, but it always does,” Tony said, smoothing back her curls. “At least for a little while.”

“I was going to do it, Daddy,” Hela told him. “I was. I had a perfectly brilliant plan. _Pabbi_ wouldn’t even let me help him. He pushed me. He pushed me away from him.”

But Loki was here, right? On Midgard. On Earth, as confirmed by several reliable sources. Loki was in the tower, unconscious but safe in bed in the infirmary, watched over by the forces of stability, in the persons of Hank and Kurt, and by a somewhat weepy, shaky (and a damn sight less stable) Bruce.

Except if Hela said, “My _Pabbi_ is in Asgard,” that’s where he was. If anyone was going to know the truth of the matter, that person was Miss Hela Lokisdottir Stark. On that subject, at the very least, she could never be bamboozled.

Which meant his husband (or at least his husband’s consciousness, probably inhabiting one of those fucking confusing avatar bodies he’d pop out now and then) could be found exactly in the one place Tony wished Loki would never, ever go again as long as he lived.

He was shit-scared of what Odin might do. And maybe—just maybe—he was slightly scared of Loki’s motives too, given what he was hearing from his daughter and others. Those rumors included the news that his husband was, in fact, the rightful heir to Asgard’s throne. Not the late Baldr. Likewise not Thor. No, his very own god of mischief.

If Loki lived, if he ended Odin’s reign, what then? What if he rediscovered his desire to rule? He was a goddamn prince, raised to be a king. What if he never came home again?

Furthermore, was Midgard really Loki’s home? Really? Or was it some sort of second-best, a thing he only accepted because the thing he desired most had been denied to him?

It made Tony feel sick, actually, more than sick, every bit of anxiety, self-doubt and shitty sense of self-worth he’d acquired in close to fifty years of bad choices and poor personal relationship skills rushing in a tsunami of scariness to the forefront of his brain—and the only real cure he’d discovered for that was for Loki to pet him and love him and croon in his ear, “Ridiculous Tony, foolish husband, _hjarta hjarta minn_ , how is it that you doubt the trueness of the adoration I feel for you?”

Only sometimes he did doubt. Partly because, as previously discussed, he wasn’t exactly the world’s #1 human being. Also because—and this was a totally other thing—to Loki his own mind was an open book written in one-syllable words, something like _Hop on Pop_ or _Go, Dog, Go!_ , but the reverse was hardly true. Forget all the stuff he couldn’t detect, half the thoughts he did glimpse in his husband’s head remained completely incomprehensible, as if written at the post-doctoral level in some ancient, incomprehensible language to which he sure as hell didn't possess a Rosetta Stone.

Still, Tony forced his thoughts into something resembling calmness, or at least put on a show. For Hela, who needed him, if not for himself.

“You sometimes have to ask the question, Empress,” he said, “‘Is this the person I want to be?’ Gods know I don’t blame you for wanting to personally ensure the Allfucker was crispy critters before you left, and then some. I’m totally with you on that one. But you’ve also gotta know your _Pabbi_ wouldn’t want that for you. Maybe later, sweetheart, there’ll come a time when you can’t escape that sort of thing. But not now, not while you’re so young. You guys are his whole world. He wants every single damn thing for you that he never got to have for himself growing up.”

“Sometimes I don’t feel young,” Hela muttered into the pillow. “Sometimes I feel really, really old. Only not today, Daddy.”

Hela truly must have been exhausted. After that, she fell asleep almost at once, and Tony sat beside her, holding her hand and listening to her breathe, thinking of how much he’d missed her when she’d been so far away in that crazy sky-kingdom.

Thinking of how, only a few short weeks before, he’d come so close to losing his entire family through bad timing, bad will and his own goddamn stupidity.

If he lost Loki, lost him so far away in another Realm or planet or dimension, whatever the hell Asgard really was, what would he do? There’d been so many close calls and sleepless nights in the past two years, each one bringing him closer to the truth.

He couldn’t live without Loki now. He couldn’t do it. Ever. Not as long as he lived.

 _Dammit, Lok_ , Tony thought, _Whatever you’re doing, whatever it is you think you have to do— and, okay, maybe you really do have to do it for us to get any peace from your crazy dad. Or maybe not. I dunno, just please come home to us. Please. Don’t die a million miles away. If you still want to be a king, be the king of our lives. You already hold undisputed title to that throne, and I’ll show you that every day, I promise I will. Just haul your shapely ass home to me, Loki_.

There wasn’t any answer, as he knew there wouldn’t be, and all Tony could do was sit, and hold his sleeping daughter’s hand, and feel afraid.

He hated that feeling, and also the knowledge that his ability to zoom up into the sky in a superpowered suit, blasting anything that got in his way, didn’t mean a goddamned thing. Neither did his smarts, nor his skill at engineering.

None of it meant anything.

Iron Man? Yeah, right.

At that moment in time, to tell the gods’ honest truth, he felt more like Marshmallow Man.

* * *

_My guy. My beautiful demon choirboy who’s too goddamn good for this shitty world_ , Logan thought, observing the sweet blue curve of his lover’s neck, the way, with his head bent, those crazy curls tumbled almost over Kurt’s closed eyes, now veiled by those long, thick, indigo lashes.

Kurt made him get sappy, there'd never been any doubt, but in this one particular instance Logan thought that might be okay. Sensing, observing the details, that had always kinda been his thing, and who could possibly be a better subject for his observations than Kurt?

He wasn’t a guy greatly given to explosions of happiness, but even in a tense, sad moment like this one Kurt could make him happy. Kurt made the world happier, just by being in it.

Yup, he had it worse than bad, that much was true.

Logan gave an inward laugh, the sound inside his head harsh and even a little cruel, the same sound his outward laugh always seemed to make. Folks only had to hear that laugh, and see the glint of his ice-cold eyes, to decide within two seconds that he was scary as fuck—but that was only half the truth.

Or only three quarters of it, anyway. The bigger, better part of himself (judging by quality, not quantity), the part that belonged especially to Kurt, was noble and pure (when at one time he hadn’t thought he had the least drop of purity left in him, that there was nothing left inside the husk of his skin but miscellaneous instincts for survival, violence, and looking out for number one) and, yes, sappy as hell, thank you very much indeed.

He watched the silent shapes of the German words form on the full curves of Kurt’s lips, and thought, _My elf. My beautiful, beautiful elf_.

“ _Gegrüßet seist du Maria, voll der Gnade_ ,” Kurt prayed.

 _Der Herr ist mit Dir._  
_Du bist gebenedeit unter den Frauen_  
_und gebenedeit ist die Frucht Deines Leibes Jesu._  
_Heilige Maria, Mutter Gottes, bitte für uns Sünder_  
_jetzt und in der Stunde unseres Todes._  
_Amen._

Yeah, it was German for sure. A prayer from heart, from the very deepest part of Kurt’s enormous, impossibly-loving heart. From his soul, which Kurt claimed he no longer possessed, that it was something left behind him in Heaven or some goddamn thing. Not English. Not Latin. Those would have meant a prayer from the head, sincerely felt, naturally, because Kurt was Kurt, and nothing, ever, but sincere.

A prayer in Kurt’s native tongue, though, meant he was praying from the place of all his deepest hopes and deepest fears.

Logan had to say it broke his own stony heart more than a little bit, because he’d known, sure, about Kurt's love for his friend, but hadn’t _known_ known.

He didn’t think he’d ever seen Kurt so upset, upset to the point of going utterly quiet, utterly still.

Even his tail trailed over the linoleum in a limp, unmoving curve.

Logan hated like hell that he couldn’t do anything. What was there to do? What good was a man of action in this kind of situation? What did he know about magic, or the battles of gods, or any of that shit?

Nothing. He was useless. Worse than useless. He couldn't even find words that would comfort the man he loved.

Kurt’s fingers counted their way to the end of the beads. Blue beads. Indigo, like Kurt’s fur. Lapis lazuli, a stone meaning spiritual love, with smaller beads of pale yellow amber in between.

The silver crucifix, adorned with oak leaves, rested in his palm.

It was a new rosary for Kurt, but at the same time very old, Loki had said. The god of mischief—who in all other instances regarded Christianity with a kind of bemused contempt (Logan had nearly laughed his ass off when Kurt told him about Loki informing Father Jerome, at St. B’s, “In the interest of full disclosure, I am a discredited pagan deity, but none have ever worshiped me”—because, yeah, that would make all the difference)--had given it to him for Christmas, in what Logan and Kurt both understood to be a touching demonstration of love and respect.

Kurt had always prayed—forgive the pun—religiously (if privately, the way he always said his god told him to, Logan rarely catching him in the act). Right now there seemed to be something feverish about his lover’s prayers.

Kurt was not a feverish person. Passionate, yes. Earnest, often. Enthusiastic, without fail. To smell the scent of desperation clinging to his lover’s lovely soft fur made Logan nervous. He’d miscalculated, added things up wrong. It disturbed him. He’d long since taken the measure of what Kurt meant to Loki, but not what Loki meant to Kurt. And now he was lying to the man he loved.

These days, older, calmer, more—he guessed it could be said—mature, Logan lived his life on maybe 70% instinct. 30% intellect. It was, in fact, a vast improvement over his past, when, though he may have been wily on a basically animal level, all instinct and the input of his senses, he could no more have thought before he acted than he could have flown to the moon by flapping his arms.

And so, Logan was lying, because every bit of that 70% was telling him that while the long, thin, pallid body with the slightly mounded belly that lay in the hospital bed, surrounded by tubes and wires and beeping machines, looked like a certain Norse god of mischief, Loki, like Elvis, had very much left the building.

Logan didn’t cry. Ever. But in this instance he wanted to, because he loved Kurt more than he’d loved anything or anyone in his life. But he also kinda loved that crazy alien kid too. More than kinda, truth be told, because although Logan knew for a fact that no son of his would be anything like Loki (for proof of that, how many of his actual goddamn literally insane sons had he so far had to part from their psycho lives on a permanent basis?), he loved Loki like a son, the son it never would have been possible for him to bring into the world.

He would have protected that poor kid to the bitter end, and never, ever have let him get hurt the way he had, if only he had known.

He’d been to Asgard, in a universe-jumping, time-traveling kind of way, and it might well, in his pretty damn well-informed opinion, be the most bassackward place in the history of the universe. Thor, Loki’s brother was an okay guy. Not the absolute sharpest tool in the shed, and back in those days way the hell too impressed with himself, but his heart was basically in the right place.

Logan had made the acquaintance there of a few smokin’-hot Shield-Maidens who fought like furies out of hell, and also had a hell of an enjoyable drinking match with a crazy ginger-haired giant called Volstagg during his days in the so-called fucking Golden Realm.

The king, though, Odin, Loki’s alleged dad--him you could smell the crazy assholeness on from five kilometers distant. He’d reeked of cruelty, completely intentional cruelty, which was a smell like rotting leaves and iron shavings.

Sometimes Logan wondered how things would have played out if at some point in his time upstairs in Asgard he’d pulled aside the scrawny-assed, hollow-eyed, stony-faced younger prince and told him, “Look, kid, do ya know that bastard ya call “Dad” is really yer grandpa? And why, by the way, do ya smell so blue and frosty?

But Loki had struck him as so damn angry at the time, balanced on a hair-trigger, not to mention unapproachable with misery--and also as a bit of a brat--so Logan had chosen to be a bit of an asshole himself, and hadn’t said a word to him.

And now, maybe because of those words not spoken, one thing leading to another, he got to watch the man he loved with his whole heart pray feverishly for the life of his dearest friend.

He also got to observe that the part of Kurt he shared might be just the proverbial tip of an iceberg Loki knew top to bottom, that probably even ol’ Chuck Xavier, with his mighty all-seeing brain, had only halfway explored.

That there were maybe depths to his lover that could only be shared, or understood by—dare he say it—another god.

Logan had felt lonely many times in his life, and pushed it aside as what Chuck might have called “a condition of the human state,” but he’d never felt a loneliness like this since Kurt’s “death.”

He’d put on an act then, sure. Played the part of Wolverine, the tough guy. The others thought he was doing okay.

He fucking wasn’t. His head was so far up his own backside even his healing factor had gone cattywampus. He’d found himself escaping to Kurt’s grave every chance he got, running his mouth at Kurt’s headstone for hours at a time because there was no one else he wanted around him, not even Kitty.

Or could stand to talk to anymore.

And they hadn’t even been lovers then, just friends. Okay, that was a lie. They hadn’t been lovers.

Leave it at that.

He wondered if Kurt knew the truth, that when he finally came back, when he’d found Logan in the snow, Logan had gone there looking for an end to everything. It might take a while, but even a man with superhuman healing should be able to freeze in a blizzard, right?

But then he’d felt snow-crusted fur, and Kurt’s soft, if chilly, cheek against his cheek, and he’d known. He’d just known.

For about a minute he believed he’d died and somehow gone to Kurt’s heaven, where the merciful god Kurt believed in with such sweet, trusting faith had let them finally be together. At the end of that minute, Logan’s common sense and his senses took over, the life rushed back into him, and he knew the truth was even better.

They were alive. Alive. Both of them. And his half-frozen self lay in the arms of a man he loved with a desperation Logan hadn’t known he was capable of feeling.

“Logan?” A hand touched his hand in the here-and now—two fingers, the brush of velvet against his skin, the slight prickle of Kurt’s palm, just the smallest bit like touching the underside of a starfish.

Logan’s head jerked up. It might even be said he did a cartoon double-take.

Kurt grinned at him, his usual warm, kind grin. His yellow eyes shone brightly. The beads of his rosary looped loosely around the fingers of his left hand, and his tail had come up again, doing a gentle sway in the air, as if that tail danced to music only it managed to hear.

“Yeah?” Logan answered hoarsely.

“It’s nearly Bruce’s time now to take over for us. Let’s go to bed, _ja? Ich bin erschöpft_.”

“Which is?”

“I’m exhausted, and I want to hold you, and make you not so sad, my lover. Will you do that for me, Logan? What do you say?”

“I’d say yer pickin' up some funny habits from Mr. Mischief there. How long have ya been able to peek inside my head, Elf?”

“When haven’t I?” Kurt laughed, his mouth curving into one of his perfectly joyful, perfectly devilish grins. “Ach, the thoughts you thought of me, my platonic best friend! It’s a wonder _Herr_ Professor didn’t blush himself to death, with the notions in your head.”

Kurt pretending to be shocked always made Logan laugh, and he found his lover’s attempts to lure him away from his own dark thoughts touching—and the truth was, he’d always found it nearly impossible to stay down in the dumps when Kurt was around him.

“C’mere, hotass,” he growled, pulling Kurt up against him, close and tight, Kurt’s tail thwapping around his waist in a velvety whip-crack, holding Logan to him even tighter than before. And once more Logan was anchored, safe, secure.

He buried his face into the soft fur of Kurt’s chest, his lover’s fingers weaving gently into his hair.

“Loki is only waiting in another place for something that must happen,” Kurt murmured. “Soon enough he’ll return to us, and all will be well.”

“Goddamn optimist,” Logan said. “Ya always say that. How in hell do ya know?”

“Oh, I know.” Kurt smiled down at him, capturing Logan’s eyes with the flickering yellow of his eyes. “Have faith, my lover.”

“Do I have to tell you two to get a room?” Banner said behind them, ambling into the infirmary. He looked, and sounded, like five-day-old crap. “There’s a fetus present. A supernaturally aware fetus. Does it talk to you too?”

“Always,” Kurt answered, unwinding himself from Logan. “He. His name is Edwin.” He laid a gentle blue hand on the curve of Loki’s belly. “ _Gute Nacht,_ sweet Edwin Amsel. Good dreams, _Herzchen_.”

Logan and Bruce exchanged a look, watching again as Kurt bent to kiss Loki’s forehead. “Peace to you, _hjarta minn_ , wherever you travel. Hurry home to us when you can.”


	20. When We All Lived in the Forest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki has 99 problems and all of them are Odin. Tony has two problems and both of them are squirrels. No, really.
> 
> Be warned--despite the squirrels (or, indeed, partially because of them), darkness abounds in this chapter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A scrivener is a clerk or scribe, the most famous being Herman Melville's Bartleby, whose default answer to every request was, "I would prefer not to." "Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!"
> 
> A chandler was originally the person responsible for wax, candles and soap in a medieval household. Later the job title expanded to include the person responsible for ship's stores. A chandler might also be a person who ran what was once called a "dry goods store," which I would imagine is what Ignaas means here.
> 
> Two fun nature facts. If you're ever near a forest and you hear a truly unnatural and unnerving sound with a certain spawn-of-hell quality to it, your probably hearing a squirrel protecting its territory. Or possibly just messing with you. Second fact, which really only acts as inspiration for the chapter, many of the native squirrels of the Pacific Northwest experienced a genetic shift a few decades ago that has caused their fur to darken considerably. On my island home, where its only mutated squirrels mating with other mutated squirrels they're essentially coal-black at this point. I expect them to develop glowing red eyes within the decade. So, if you're questioning why this chapter is so dark, just consider that I live in the middle of Mirkwood surrounded by shrieking ebony squirrels. Ah, Home Sweet Home! 
> 
> Rocket J. Squirrel is the more sensible flying-squirrel buddy of Bullwinkle T. Moose from the Bullwinkle cartoons. Sandy the Squirrel is a good friend of Spongebob Squarepants. And I just ear-wormed myself.
> 
> I'm messing with Marvel canon (again) re: the founding of the West Coast Avengers. Tony is  
> mocking Simon Williams, who unlike him was a decent scientist but crappy businessman. He was bamboozled by his slimy brother, eventually gained super-powers thanks to a mad scientist-type, and in the comics provided the brain-wave patterns that gave Vision human consciousness. Natasha is right about the bright red safari jacket, but the leisure suit (single most horrid garment in human history) would have been worse. 
> 
> Continuing a little in the alternate-canon vein, a little taste of what happened with the Ultron of this reality. Proof that sometimes the generic brand just won't do, especially when building killer robots.
> 
> In my comicverse-influenced head, Wanda and Pietro are still Magneto's biological kids, just as they are in the comics. The missile clearly killed their loving adoptive parents.
> 
> Ratatoskr--lies, gossip and provocation a specialty!-- is the squirrel that runs up and down the world tree, Yggdrasil, carrying messages between the dragon at the roots and the eagle at the top.

* * *

“We must soon leave the wood,” Ignaas said at last, when only a thin red edge of light shone between the trees. He still felt slightly shy about how he ought properly to address a god. Loki did not appear to him a god of easy wrath, and yet it seemed disrespectful to call him merely by his given name, as if he was a man of no rank from the village, a baker, a scrivener or a chandler who kept a shop.

“At twilight my good wife begins to watch for me, and will worry if I do not return. Especially in winter she fears the hunger of the wild beasts in the wood. My Lord,” the woodcutter added uncertainly, settling upon that title as the one least likely to cause offense.

The god raised an eyebrow in his direction. That it was a haughty eyebrow could not be denied, though the rest of the god’s well-favoured face appeared to smile at him.

“Loki only, I pray of you, good Ignaas. As I have said, my godhood is a matter of some debate.”

He seated himself upon the stump—no more remained of the terrible tree except sawn logs and that remnant, with half its roots still in the earth and half its roots snarling up against the ever-darkening indigo of the sky.

Loki pushed back the threads of hair that had worked their way loose from his long, night-black plait. He fidgeted a little upon the stump, then sighed, his expression clearly relaying that the danger wild animals might present to a mortal man had quite slipped his mind, along with the certainty that a wife might worry if her man tarried away from home past his accustomed time.

_Are there no wild beasts in the forests of the gods_? Ignaas wondered.

“Yes…” said Loki at last, thoughtfully. “I had hoped… But yes, I understand. I disremembered. Tony often worried so--though there was no need--if I returned late to the tower, and would then fuss at me, which was tedious, yet also strangely flattering. By no means would I grieve your good wife. You have been such excellent company, Ignaas, I did not consider… Yes, you must go at once, before the dark falls altogether. Your forgiveness also I pray of you, for I never intended to keep you late.”

The god wiped sweat from his brow with the sleeve of his once-fine shirt. Moss and dirt besmirched his clothing as deeply as they did Ignaas’s, for Loki had laboured mightily that day. His excellent black boots bore many scuffs and creases, scarred by stone and wood alike.

He appeared sad, as well, and somewhat discouraged, the corners of his fine mouth down-turned.

Though Loki had not cut so much as a single stick of the wood, lest--as he related--he bring the cruel curse down upon his innocent children's heads, he insisted that Ignaas must rest as he himself loaded every bit of it, great log and twigling, onto the sledge. He had also made a thing to happen, detectable neither to the woodcutter’s eyes, nor to his rational mind, which ensured the wood fit excellently well, down to its last splinter, as if the sledge had been created solely for that burden.

Though Ignaas and Hanne pried and tugged, sweated and cursed, struggling to pull the last of the tree-trunk from its stubborn socket of earth, it was only by Loki’s great strength that the stump stood so far uprooted as it did. The god had slipped his slender body into the narrow crevice beneath, and bearing the whole huge weight upon his shoulder, heaved it upward, until the stump lay upon its side on the ground, looking suddenly defeated in every way but in the angry tangle of its upright roots.

If Ignaas had not suspected before that his companion was a god, he would surely have known then. Such strength was never the gift of mortal men, not even of the heroes of the antique tales.

The woodcutter ached with his labours from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet. He could think of little beyond his own home and the warmth of his fireside, where he would soon be able to wash, and eat, and then go to lie in his own bed, Mirjam’s warm, soft body contained within the circle of his arms, as they drifted together into sleep, wild beasts and the chill of winter shut firmly outside their doors.

A single tear, like melted silver, rolled slowly down Loki’s cheek, though he did not seem to notice its passage.

“I will bid you goodnight then,” the god said, in his soft and pleasant voice, reaching up to stroke Hanne’s soft brown nose, resting his head for a moment against the horse’s powerful neck. “It is indeed well that you return to your wife who awaits you. I would not worry her for all the Realms. Perhaps leave your sledge here to be further filled, but take this good horse of yours as a companion on the journey homeward.”

Loki rose to his feet, his long fingers twisted in the russet hairs of Hanne’s abundant mane. “As you are my friend, however new, Ignaas, on the morrow will you return to me? If it pleases you?” A tone came into his voice, not of actual pleading--perhaps, being a god, not even desperation served as great enough reason to allow himself such a thing--but of a deep and soul-wounding longing.

“Help me, please, to complete, Friend Ignaas, the task we started together on this day?” Despite Loki’s pride—if that was indeed what restrained his actions and his speech--something remained in his attitude of a boy who forced himself to be brave beyond his years, and it smote mightily at the woodcutter’s kind heart.

He did not wish to leave Loki alone in the dark with his silent, still-potent enemy.

He did not wish to leave him at all.

“But you must be hungry and weary,” Ignaas said. “Come home with me, L… good friend. Sleep this night in a warm bed, for we have a fine one to spare. Eat of the evening meal my wife will have prepared, which, have my assurance, will nourish you, and besides be surpassingly pleasant in taste.”

“Greatly do I long to accompany you,” Loki said, with a sad smile. “And yet I must not leave, not before the last of this terrible old man has been pried from the earth, and his wooden bones removed from this place.”

The god’s head bowed. He sat once more, drawing his knees up to his chest. “Truly, Ignaas, I shall do well enough alone. I am accustomed to being solitary.”

“But then you will live as a guest beneath my roof, until the last wicked stick of him burns away to ashes.” Ignaas rested a hand on Loki’s shoulder, the god’s slender bones themselves hard as sticks beneath his gloved palm.

“Yes,” Loki answered. “Until the last stick is burned, and then I may go home to those I have made lonely by lingering to see this done. You are very kind, Ignaas, to come to me here, when I had despaired of ever finding a friend in all this cold country, and because of your kindness, though you ask it not, I will surely grant you a boon before I leave. And now, indeed, I must not keep you longer, when the hour grows so late.”

Ignaas departed the clearing with sorrow in his heart, and even his good horse Hanne followed with a sad slowness, every line of his great bulky form looking as despondent as any horse might possibly appear.

The woodcutter became aware that, even as he walked away, he found himself turning round again and again to regard the god’s face, until it was only a distant white oval, shining through the darkness like the light of the waning moon.

Ignaas thought that he had never seen another person look so lonely and, thank the gods, would never see such loneliness again, for only a god could suffer so and not break before the waves of despair.

Full dark had long since fallen by the time Ignaas reached his home, and his sweet wife awaited him on the doorstep, flying to his arms the moment he shut the gate behind him. He held her long and close, breathing in her scent of fresh bread and spicy wood-smoke, feeling her body against his, so warm, so joyful and full of life.

Ignaas began the tale of his day in the eastern wood as he himself rubbed down one side of Hanne and Mirjam rubbed down the other, both working in cheerful union, as was their wont. He then strapped on a fresh horse-rug, to ensure his good companion would not take chill, while his wife fed Hanne a pail of the warm bran mash she’d readied for their return, the two of them laughing together as Hanne snorted and slurped in horsey contentment, nudging them with his powerful shoulders, as if good-naturedly sharing the joke.

Ignaas talked on as they took their evening meal, sharing between them the bread, the ale and the rich mutton stew. His wife’s kind brown eyes grew thoughtful, then sad, as the story progressed.

Never once, through it all, did she suggest Ignaas spun for her a tall tale, or say he should not return to the clearing. No more did she insist another ought to take up the burden of burning the wood from that evil tree.

Instead, at the end of it all, when the dishes had been cleared and the cottage set to rights for the night, when they spread out a sheepskin rug over the hearthstones and sat upon it, facing the bright flames. Mirjam reached for Ignaas’s work-roughened hand, holding it warmly between both of her own.

“Oh, the poor boy. The poor boy,” she said in a soft voice, “Do you think he has waited there alone a very long time?”

Ignaas hadn’t the heart to tell her—whose own heart was so tender--his own thought, that Loki had likely waited alone in the wild wood, with only the wicked, whispering voice of the terrible old man-tree for company, far longer than either of them could hold in their heads.

“I’d think he’ll be glad of a good meal and a warm bed when he comes to our home,” was all he told his wife, “And we will make him welcome with us for as long as he must stay.”

But wise Mirjam had a way of knowing things for her own self, no matter what her husband said, and her face remained thoughtful, her eyes no less sad.

“Tomorrow I will bring him home, love,” Ignaas promised, “And then all will be well.”

When, with sunrise, Ignaas went again to the clearing in the eastern wood, he found the god huddled, shaking, beneath the tree that had sheltered him for so many long days, weeping there like a heartbroken boy.

Hanne snorted and backed away, unwilling to enter the clearing for the sake of either love or obedience, so that Ignaas was forced to tether him at some distance from that place before he could return.

The clearing stank, and the stench could not be mistaken for any smell but the sweet, terrible ripeness of death. Body upon body upon body lay still upon the ground, the corpses those of every creature of the woodland that burrows and tunnels into the earth, to gnaw upon the roots and other things concealed within the soil.

Even the unloved beasts became pitiful there, stretched out on the half-frozen forest floor, blood upon their muzzles and their paws.

“I did not mean it,” Loki cried out in despair. “Ignaas, I did not! I meant the little creatures no harm. When I summoned them to dig out and consume his roots, I believed I only called on them to do what they have always done, back to the beginning of their kinds. I meant no cruelty here, but _Nornir_ , it is New York all over again! It is New York. I mean to do well. I do. Yet ever I fail.”

Ignaas sighed. He did not know the name, “New York,” of which the sorrowful god spoke, but he knew what must be done to make some small remedy.

He took the knife from his belt and the flint from his pocket, kindling first a small blaze, then feeding it with sticks of the evil old tree until it had grown to a great fire. Loki dried his eyes and composed himself, then, watching Ignaas work. The flames hissed and spat, angry as cats, as one might expect from such green wood, but for all that burned like greed or hunger.

Loki observed the woodcutter’s work for some moments, an expression of deepest pain upon his face, skin whiter than white, fine hands trembling.

“I think we must burn them,” Ignaas explained gently, “If they carry his poisonous roots in their bellies. I know it is a terrible thing...”

The god considered, then softly said, “You are wise, my friend, and correct in this. They must be burned to ash and the roots consumed within them, their ashes scattered to the winds. But though I may bring them to the blaze, I may not, for my life, lay the bodies on the fire. And yet, all fault is mine. I wish in my heart that I might spare you, Ignaas, all the work of this awful day.”

“I will accomplish the task… Loki, my friend.” Again, Ignaas laid his hand upon his companion’s trembling shoulder, and the god smiled painfully up at him.

Though he seemed no less godlike to the woodcutter’s eyes, Loki reminded him greatly of his brother when he was quite young, dismayed by something in the harshness of the world around him.

Before the day his brother, brave in his scarlet uniform, had gone for a soldier, never again to come home.

“Sometimes the Realms are cruel beyond bearing,” Loki said, with sympathy.

“And sometimes they are not,” Ignaas answered, smiling kindly in return. He hoped, at the least, to give the god courage, if only to fight his way through that grisly day.

* * *

Tony was not, let it be said, a big fan of squirrels.

Because, well, first off, _rodents_...

Sure, they were cute and all, he supposed, rocketing around trees with their big puffy tails and cunning little paws...

But then there was the time, a while back, when he’d been innocently strolling through Central Park, trying to work out a nutty (no pun too low for Tony Stark, ladies and gentlemen) design problem in his head.

Suddenly, this unholy screech-hiss noise erupted right above him that could only, possibly, have been made by a large group of the evilest denizens of hell (if hell actually existed, which Tony categorically refused to believe it did). Tony’d flung up his arms to ward off evil, giving himself an impromptu coffee shower, and probably flinging the cup itself halfway to New Jersey. His brain snapped into overdrive, burning through scenarios of how he could possibly defend himself against the hell-beast without a suit, only to observe a fat little gray-brown furry fiend with puffed-out cheeks glaring down from a branch above his head, clutching an antioxidant-rich almond in its greedy little mitts.

The let-down was so profound it nearly made Tony feel sick.

“You’re an asshole. You know that, right? A fucking, furry little asshole.” Tony told it.

The asshole squirrel puffed out its overstuffed cheeks to make the sound again, even louder than before. That goddamned wasn’t just unpleasant, it was fucking unnerving.

“You know, there's a good chance it was rabid,” Bruce told him earnestly, probably trying to make Tony feel better, after Tony related what had happened. “You could have been seriously injured.”

At which point Natasha gave a supremely Russian snicker, and Clint actually fell off his chair, he was laughing so hard.

Eventually even Bruce cracked a grin.

“I hate you. I hate you all. I’m going back to Malibu and joining the West Coast Avengers.”

The West Coast Avengers were Director's latest bright idea. He didn’t want to “divide the focus” of his A-Team—though rumor said he had a high-ranking underling he wanted to get rid of in a subtle way, and the B-Team was his excuse to send the dude packing.

“They have this dickwad…”

“Language!” Cap chimed in, like he always did.

“Bite me,” Tony answered.

This was a certain time after the Battle of New York, after he’d blown up all his suits in an epic Tony+Pepper vs. The World battle, then ditched the arc reactor, but also after he’d thought up an even better way to fire up his suits and built a whole kickass new series (at the same time building a companion piece to J.A.R.V.I.S. that kinda-sorta took possession of his best suit, then also kinda-sorta nearly got to the point of destroying the world).

Only it didn’t. So there.

But only because Loki’s scepter, which Tony’d used to fire up his new baby, turned out to actually not be so much _actual_ Loki’s _actual_ scepter, and at the crucial moment his beautiful Ultron, like so many other guys, had suffered, uh… performance issues, let’s say.

He’d basically gone spectacularly phut in the middle of a monomaniacal gloat, poor metal bastard.

Which meant, at that point in time, after Ultron, after the complete crashing-and-burning of his thing with Pep, but slightly before the fauxlicarrier, Latveria, and the total fucking change of Tony’s life, Director, Maria Hill and every single one of his fellow Avengers had declared open season on Tony Stark, humor-wise.

He’d supposed he really hadn’t helped matters by revealing he’d just been freaked out by a fucking squirrel.

“So,” Tony continued, “The WCA have this dude? He has kaleidoscope eyes and his uniform is a red leisure suit. That’s right, I would rather fight evil alongside a guy in a leisure suit than with any of you jerks.”

“Want us to pack you some snacks for the road?” Clint asked innocently, between giggles, from his position of authority on the floor.

“Be fair. Simon’s a pretty nice guy," Natasha said. "A little insecure, but nice.”

Natasha had been charged with helping set up the California branch during a temporary lull in the East Coast action. Also to ride herd on that crazy kid Wanda, who in point of fact wasn't so much an orphan as the natural daughter of--get this--Magneto.

Yup, that Magneto. The mutant supervillain. The crazy was strong with that family.

“And it’s not actually a leisure suit. It's is a red safari jacket,” Natasha began, before bursting into helpless giggles herself.

So, to cut off a long story before it got hopeless, Tony Stark was done with squirrels.

Unless their names were Rocket J. or Sandy the, he didn’t want to know.

Only, Tony, right at the moment, and in the here-and-now, was pretty sure he was dreaming. For one thing, he sat on his ass on some soggy, weird-looking moss by a pond that really could have used a couple koi, a few water-lilies and a decorative fountain to perk it up a little. The night sky looked vaguely green, and the air smelled weird, like rot and brick dust and electrical fires. And he was dreaming about squirrels.

Or, rather, about _a_ squirrel.

The thing perched up in a tree, a fucking ginormous tree, by any standards. An ash, maybe?

The squirrel in his dream was red as rust and big as a Rottweiler, with a tail like the luxurious mink stole Howard had given Tony’s mother to keep up appearances with, at the events Mr. Big-Shot actually allowed her to attend, now and then, so that people wouldn't talk about where she'd disappeared to.

The squirrel had big standing-up tufts of fur like antennae on the tops of its ears. It was also--no exaggeration--fucking creepy as hell, mainly because it possessed claws that would have made a velociraptor say, “ _No, no, they’re too much! I couldn’t possibly!_ ” Also because Tony could see its semi-rotted chisel-shaped teeth through the holes in its equally semi-rotted zombie-movie-special-effects cheeks.

Had Tony mentioned creepy as fucking hell? Because it was.

The monster squirrel rocked back and forth a little on the thick, scabby branch it occupied, muttering to itself in its crazy squirrel-voice, looking in dire need of anti-psychotic meds,

Then flicked its tail. And made THE NOISE.

From its Rottweiler-sized throat, THE NOISE was horrifying beyond belief. It filled up the world, ringing, increasing, hanging on the air, but just when Tony thought he couldn’t stand to listen one more second, it just… went away.

Instead, the squirrel, still rocking on its perch, began to speak, wringing together its not-quite-human hands, rattling its claws.

It could not be called an improvement over what came before. If anything, it was worse.

Tony rapid-shifted in an instant from amused-at-the-weirdness-and-maybe-a-little-freaked, into honest-to-all-of-the-gods-of-the-Northmen-make-this-fucking-thing-go-away, terrified not because he been rattled by hearing a weird, unexpected sound from above him when he had his mind on other matters, but because this... this _thing_ …

It was evil, corrupt, bad, the smell of the wickedness around it worse then the smell of the rot. It came from the cellar, from the dark at the back of the closet, from the shadows under the bed, the places where all the things live that know you are small, and weak, and can’t defend yourself.

It came from the dark, dark places between the trees in the vast, trackless wood.

What was that thing Loki always said?

“'Once upon a time...' is good enough for modern tales, _hjarta minn_ , but the true stories, the old and powerful stories, always begin, ‘When we all lived in the forest and no one lived anywhere else…’”

Loki’s clear eyes had clouded as he spoke the phrase. “Those are the stories, my husband, that I know to be true. Perhaps I, or another Loki, act a part in some of them.”

_But they're only fairy tales,_ Tony wanted to whine _, They're not real._

Except Tony got the feeling that Loki, out of kindness and love, was trying warn him about something even he couldn't put into words. For once in his life, Tony'd curbed his tongue, put his arms around his husband and pulled him close instead.

After a while, he'd murmured, "That was another place, Lok. That was another place. Now you're safe. Now you're here. You're here."

Stories were supposed to be stories. Fictional, not real. A kinder, gentler, more socially acceptable way of telling lies, in order to be called an author, not a liar instead.

"Do you wish for words that are true?” hissed the monster in his dream. “Man of Iron, mortal man, sample these: the liar god's false body corrupts, he cannot make another now. Six he has buried beneath the high trees, leaping from one to the other, but seven is the magic number. When seven fails, with the Great God left unburned, believe what I tell you.

“He will never unweave the worlds to come home to you.”

Tony jerked out of sleep, screaming, and though all three of his boys held him tight and made every effort to comfort him, he couldn’t hear a word they tried to tell him.


	21. Out of the Woods

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce comforts Tony. Loki puts one of Ignaas's concerns to rest, though the woodcutter is too shy to ask about the other. In the tower, new connections are made.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Barry White was a soul singer known for his distinctively deep "sexy times" voice and such hits as " _Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Babe_ ".
> 
> " _The rains came down, and the floods came up_." Bruce was absolutely right--Tony was quoting a "churchy song," specifically, that staple of Sunday Schools " _The Wise Man and the Foolish Man_ " written by Ann Ormley in 1948.
> 
>  _Verklempt_ =choked with emotion. I'd imagine that Tony is hearing it in the voice of Mike Myers as his character Linda Richman in the " _Coffee Talk _" sketches on _Saturday Night Live_.__
> 
> Michelinheimr is better known to the rest of us as Muspelheim, though Tony actually means Svartalfheimr.
> 
> In my head canon, Bruce is a World Music fan (and Tony teases him about his hippy music tastes). _"Prince Heathen"_ is a traditional English song--Child Ballads #104, in fact. Perhaps Bruce is familiar with English folk great Martin Carthy's 1969 version, from his album of the same name. He may have forgotten it's really a pretty awful song, with xenophobia, sexual assault, and a _Taming of the Shrew_ type of situation in the lyrics.
> 
> Tony previously related (in _Eastward in Ironwood_ ) that after returning from Asgard after Loki's "death," his brother went into an extended period of mourning that involved sad songs and pickled herring.
> 
>  _Fenrisulven_ =the Swedish version of Fenrir-wolf
> 
>  _min kära, modig varg_ =my good, sweet wolf
> 
> The translation of " _The Eensy, Weensy Spider_ " (aka " _The Itsy, Bitsy Spider_ " into _"Imse vimse spindel"_ comes from the website _Mama Lisa's World International Music & Culture_.

* * *

“Are you going to be okay?” Bruce asked Tony, in his special, extra-deep. “I’m way too concerned to even flip you shit” voice.

He had no idea what had even brought his best friend to the Stark family temporary home in the middle of the night. Had one (or all) of the boys been concerned enough to send up the Bat-Signal?

“Please, not the Barry White voice. Anything but the Barry White voice,” he answered, trying to compensate for Bruce’s total lack of flipped shit with some way over-flipped shit of his own.

He failed miserably. For one thing, he guessed his surreptitious attempt to wipe off all the sweat and tears off his face with the sleeve of his tee-shirt probably wasn't all that surreptitious, for another...

That fucking scary squirrel dream had freaked him out to a ridiculous extent, his voice had that moist, tremble-y tone that made him sound like he might well be gearing up to cry again, and his hands were shaking so badly the surface of the glass of water Bruce had brought him seemed to have developed a wave pattern.

He wasn’t going to cry again. Really. But he sure as hell sounded that way, even to his own ears.

“Yeah,” Bruce answered.

That one word seemed to contain a whole lot of extra content. Or maybe Tony meant sub-text. Whatever it was, it sounded like one of the kindest things anyone had ever said to him, and the floodgates just… opened.

"' _The rains came down, and the floods came up,' as the old song says," he quipped, in a choked kind of way._

“How do you, Prince Heathen, even know that song?” Bruce asked him, when Tony was still lying in a soggy, boneless mess against the shoulder of his cheap, scratchy sweater.

Bruce needed better sweaters. Why did the best friend and ScienceBro of Tony Stark not have better sweaters? This one smelled kind of like a wet collie, though he supposed that might be more his own fault, at the moment, than Bruce's.

Maybe Pep's mom could take a temporary break from outfitting Loki with all the knitwear in the world long enough to make Bruce a new sweater. Maybe with a big "B" (or possibly a "H") on the front, like the Weasley sweaters in _Harry Potter_.

Tony had never met Pepper's mom (though Loki had, probably because Loki was presentable and actually had manners), so in his head he took the extra step of making her look exactly like Molly, mum of the large Weasley clan, from the movies.

“That, my friend, is a churchy song,” Bruce continued. "I learned it in Sunday School when my aunt kidnapped me." He paused, his mouth twisting into a few different strange shapes. "Every Sunday. To get me away from my dad at least one day a week."

“Unbeliever, not heathen,” Tony mumbled, because pointless arguing always made him feel better, and also to distract his bestie from tumbling along with him into the deep, deep pit of despair.

Tony snuffled wetly. Bruce curved his warm hand around the back of his neck, in the most tender way possible--an almost fatherly way--and it came to him that if Bruce ever let himself heal, if he ever got rid of all those walls and barriers and fears (and, yeah, of course, Big Green) he’d make the best dad. It was heartbreaking, how good a dad Bruce could be, if he was allowed, just for once, to be only Bruce.

“That isn’t ever going to be,” Bruce said quietly, as Tony got ready to protest that when Loki…

But then it smacked him right in the face what his friend was really saying, in a gentle and roundabout way: that there wasn't much time left, that everything Bruce could see told him Loki _wouldn't_ be coming back again, that his husband had sacrificed himself to save his brother, all of which helped him get in another good five minutes of near-hysterical crying time. Then he stopped. Cold turkey.

“"And darkness was upon the face of the deep,'” Tony said, just to distract Bruce, and mess with him a little, and even to make him wonder.

The truth was, he picked up most of it from Kurt’s head, both the "And darkness..." line and the song, because Kurt filled in teaching Sunday School now and then at St. B's, when he didn't have bigger fish to fry. He sometimes wondered what the parents of the Sunday School kids thought about that--but then, the whole point, he guessed, was that St. Bernadette's, being mutant-friendly, put their money where their mouth was. It would be hard, anyway, not to see Kurt as pretty much a one-man object lesson about not judging others by their appearance.

Anyway, Tony had cried himself out. Perhaps for all time. Amen.

He wasn’t sure if the sensation that followed should be called peacefulness or numbness. All he knew was that, in addition to the feeling (whatever it might have been) he felt damp, sweaty and gross, his stomach completely messed up, both with worry and with carrying around sadness for what now felt like forever.

He felt fragile, which at the moment seemed exactly like the opposite of what he needed to be.

What he needed was to be Lord of his Meadhall, or whatever the fuck. He couldn’t be lying here in the middle of the afternoon getting all _verklempt_ because he’d had a bad dream about a talking squirrel.

Only this wasn’t his Meadhall. His Meadhall had been gutted by fire brought down from on high by a thunder god. A god who just happened to be his studly, good-hearted, culinary-student bro-in-law, who at that particular moment wasn’t godding over or studying anything.

Ever since waking up after the… incident (for lack of a better word) Thor had been a fixture by his brother’s bedside in the poky little infirmary. It was a good _Æsir_ dudes didn’t do the offensive body odor thing, because Thor refused to leave even to shower or change clothes, and because of this had begun to smell slightly like an old leather-bound book.

Like a leather-bound book and guilt, in point of fact, which was an interesting combination, to say the least.

In his better times, Thor sat in a big chair, snacked compulsively on junk food, and worked his way through the literary output of Stephen King while holding his brother's hand.

On less-good days he took off both his shirt and shoes, knelt beside Loki’s bed and, clinging to his brother’s hand, sang a series of dismal, monotonous songs in _Æs_. They may not have been as dismal as the songs Thor had sung when Loki had supposedly died in Michelinheimr, or whatever the hell it was called, but they were dismal enough.

The day of pickled herring and reckoning was rapidly approaching, and Tony knew it, despite trying to maintain, against all hope and logic, the pretense that Loki, who hated dismal, monotonous songs with a vengeance, would suddenly sit up and proclaim in his cranky voice (which was still a lovely voice indeed), “Brother, this must indeed stop at once!”

 _Husband, this must stop_ , said Loki’s beautiful voice, very kindly and gently inside his head. _You must make a home for our children, and you must love them enough for both of us. There is no other way, beloved._

But Tony knew it wasn't really Loki's voice at all, as much as he might wish, only the voice of his own common sense.

Tony took a moment to towel himself off with the huge wad of Kleenex Bruce passed him, then picked up his StarkPhone, tapping the screen.

“I’m sending you contacts, Bruce," he said, attempting to sound crisp instead of sodden. "A few of them, actually. They're Loki’s friends in the U.K. and Germany. The one that says "Sherlock" you should definitely delegate to Natasha. Honestly, you’ll thank me later. Call John and Mary first, let John know Nat’s going to call his friend. He can smooth the way for her ahead of time, if that's at all possible.”

Bruce smiled a little. “Loki’s son. The difficult one.”

Tony gave a creaky little laugh. “Understatement.”

He made a few more taps, getting legal on the line. He had to do something about Sleip. Sleip who was entirely without a paper trail of any sort in this world. Well, that was easy enough. One would just have to be created, like Loki’s was created, and the other kids'--totally fictitious, completely water-tight.

Also, Sleipnir needed, legally, to be his son. Now rather than later on that one.

“Tyrone? It’s Tony,” he said into the phone, as brisk and businesslike as anyone could possibly want. “How do you feel about a challenge, bro?”

From behind his steel-rimmed glasses, Bruce gave him puppy-dog eyes.

Tony really, really needed him to cease and desist. How was he supposed to keep his shit together, with Bruce--or anyone else--shooting him vibes of gentle sympathy and supportiveness? He needed them to pretend everything was A-okay, just like he was doing. What else had repression been invented for, if not for these exact situations?

If he had grieving to do in the future--which yeah, okay, he expected he (definitely) would--he'd grieve alone with the kids, who were all he had left of his heart.

* * *

The path through the wood, though narrow, seemed not so overgrown as it had been. The ruts and cracks had smoothed, and even the snow had melted, yet no mud remained in its place.

Ignaas glanced to his companion, guessing that he saw in Loki’s white face and silently-moving lips the reason for their clearer trail. Hanne also seemed not to strain so much with the weight of the overburdened sledge as the woodcutter might have expected.

“He is very strong, my horse Hanne,” Ignaas told the god. “You needn’t spend all your strength to help him.”

He caught the white, sideways flash of Loki’s smile.

“I should scarcely be worthy of the name 'god' if it cost all the strength I owned, merely to ease the passage of a sledge.”

“Yet you are tired,” Ignaas said, calmly and reasonably, setting his hand between Loki's shoulders. Sweat had soaked through his clothing, and despite the chill, he had set aside his heavy green cloak.

“A little,” the god replied. “But only a little. Like any man, I will be better when I have eaten, then rested for a time.”

“Yet you touched nothing of the midday-meal I brought in my pail.”

“You laboured hard, good friend, and Mirjam packed the provisions for you, not for me.”

“She put in extra for you to eat,” Ignaas protested. “She would not have you go hungry. She would not think of it! I shall be scolded when we reach home.”

“Did she?” Loki blinked at him in surprise. “That was kind! But you have said she is a woman of generous heart, and now I see for myself that is true. What an extraordinary thing to do!”

 _Do they not know of kindness in the Land of the Gods?_ Ignaas wondered, and regarding the sorrow in his companion's face, he thought perhaps they did not--or if they did, Loki had, in his life, received but little of what was offered.

"I was the god of mischief," Loki murmured, almost too softly for Ignaas to hear. "Much was my fault. Or said to be my fault, if there is, in fact a difference."

They had come at last out of the forest and into the cleared, snow-whitened fields. The air smelled of lemons and clean silver, and the sky appeared silvery too, perhaps with more snow soon to fall.

“Would you mind very much if we rested?” Loki asked. “Only for a brief time. To catch our breath.”

“I would welcome a rest,” Ignaas answered, though he was a strong young man, and needed not in the least to stop.

He perched atop the highest rail of the split-rail fence that marked the edge of the wood, bringing out his long pipe from the quilted breast of his jerkin. He filled the bowl carefully, watching the god from the corner of one eye.

Loki was too tall to need to climb up onto the fence. He merely stepped back and perched, then rose again, balancing with his heels on the lower rail as he rolled his cloak to a bundle, in order to sit upon its cushioning folds, instead of on the sharp-edged wood.

“Ah, a great improvement!” he exclaimed. Reaching over with one long pointer finger, he set a spark atop the leaves in the bowl of Ignaas’s pipe.

It caught most satisfactorily there, and the woodcutter puffed in contentment for a moment or more. “You are a useful companion, Loki,” he said. “Though you have a bony arse.”

“Most regrettably,” the god answered, with a rueful laugh. “Tony seems to like it, though. Your fence is fiendishly hard, like iron, almost.”

“'Tony.'" Ignaas felt the texture of the strange name with his tongue. "Tony? Is that the name of your wife? Is she a god, as you are a god?"

Certain tales said the gods took wives, just as men did, and for much the same reasons--for companionship, for help and, when fortune smiled, for the getting of children. Though fortune had not smiled in this way upon him or on Mirjam, he would hold to her still, without wavering until the end of their days, he cared for her so.

Perhaps gods never suffered such turnings-away of their luck. Loki had spoken often to Ignaas of his numerous children, and of the great love he bore for each.

Loki gave another soft laugh, but said nothing. His eyes turned to Ignaas once more, narrowing slightly as he studied the woodcutter’s face.

“Your leman, then?” Ignaas pried, though he did not mean it badly. He only felt a great curiosity about the lives of gods in general, and Loki in particular. To cover his unmannerly eagerness, he moved to pass Loki his pipe, but the god only shook his head.

“I care not for the flavour, though Pepper, my dear friend, smokes often, thinking I do not know--though I most certainly do. And Logan has been known to smoke of the most dreadful cigars. I like the smell of yours, however, for it reminds me of other days, my days as a student, and there is comfort in those memories, of doing in the world what I was meant to do.”

Loki paused again before speaking. “Logan is a mortal man of my acquaintance. A powerful man, wise in his ways and something like a father. More a father to me, at any rate, than... another. He is the leman—the beloved, I take it, is how you mean the word—of the most-dear friend-of-my-heart, for I live amongst mortals always now, though in a city of tall towers very different from this countryside. In that place it is acceptable to many, in these days, not to be a lover of women. I am not a lover of women, Ignaas.”

The woodcutter considered that a long while, and then began to laugh heartily.

"I was mistaken in you, then." Loki shot him a look of pure ire, then slipped down from the fence, stalking angrily on his long, thin legs across the ice-rimed field.

“No, no, Loki, my friend!” Ignaas called, running after the god, slipping a little now and then upon the icy earth in his haste. “Please do not take offense, for I meant none.”

He caught up to Loki easily, gripping his slender arm with a gentle hand.

“You are a being of such beauty, dear god, dear friend, and also of such grace. Of such kindness and consideration besides, I ought to have seen at once you were a two-spirited being. Truly, the fault is mine, in the dullness of my understanding, and no other may be blamed. I'd only thought... Forgive me, my Lord... One hears such stories of gods, at times, of their ways with the wives of men, and though my wife is faithful beyond all distrust, you are very comely, and charming and also full of magic. I thought you might not know it is wrong to interfere with another man’s wife, as is the way of gods, but I could not think how to ask you not to do it, for you are to be my guest, and also I like you so, Loki. I wanted never to offend you.”

Loki laughed too then, and wrapped his arms around Ignaas, embracing him like a brother, the woodcutter’s heart beating fast with joy, that the god was not angry with him.

"In my country," Loki said, the slightest flavour of bitterness in his voice, "We are called _ergi_ , for our divided souls alone. As for our bodies... For our bodies we are utterly despised, and that is the way at times, also, in my city New York, my city of great towers. However that may be, I should never have thought, my friend, that you would hold such hatred against me, for I have seen nothing of that in all I have seen, least of all in your kindness and brave heart. Henceforth, let us hold no secrets from one another, good Ignaas, but speak our souls with honesty."

"Let it indeed be so," the woodcutter agreed, and indeed it would be so—except for one secret, a question Ignaas had no heart to ask his companion, knowing whatever truth Loki told him would only bring pain, of one or another sort.

The question of why, lying upon the ground in the forest as if they only slept, Ignaas had spied six bodies, naked and pale and as like to Loki’s as one pea is to another in the pod. But these other Lokis did not sleep. Their hearts did not beat. They possessed no breath.

They were dead, and Ignaas neither knew why they lay there, nor what was their meaning in his world. He felt, also, terribly awkward and shy of asking such questions of a god.

* * *

There wasn’t anything specifically wrong with the guest suite. As such. The whole family agreed. Even Tony (provisionally)

It had a kitchen, where Mrs. Ransome came in to cook, the same way she had at the penthouse, a dining area where they all ate together, a living room for cuddling, movies and board games, and enough bedrooms and bathrooms for everyone to have his or her own. That it wasn't home couldn't be helped and (mostly) no one blamed Thor. They understood what had happened (again, kinda-sorta).

The truth was, as temporary Meadhalls went, Tony knew it could realistically be seen as better decorated than the penthouse. It gave more of a sense that it had been put together by someone with an actual flair for design, and less of his own pre-Loki “ _dammit, I’m filthy, stinking rich but my mental age veers between twelve and sixteen and my entire home is a man-cave_ ” personal style--which at least could be said to be a step up from Bruce’s “Modern (and Depressed) Poverty” decor.

Hela, of course, had at first sight damned their temporary home with a perfectly Lokiesque lifted brow, a sniff, and the faint praise of, “At least it isn’t _brown_."

Hela didn't say the same thing they all didn't say: that it wasn't so much that this wasn't home, or that it wasn't the penthouse, but what place could be home without _Pabbi_ to love all of them? 

The kids would talk about visiting Edwin in the infirmary, but they never talked about visiting _Pabbi_ these days. Like Hela, the boys knew he wasn't there with them.

That they couldn't reach him anywhere nearly broke their little hearts, Hela's (Tony suspected) more than anyone's. She felt responsible, angry and guilty and as if she'd somehow failed, as if Loki's peril was her fault in every way, even though he'd been the one who sent her back home.

Actually, the fact that the guest suite incorporated a whole heaping amount of green into its color schemes was probably, Tony guessed, what made him subconsciously choose this particular suite over the others available. All that green could at least remind him of Loki, as if he needed reminding, ever. That, and the suite occupied the same floor as Thor’s place, only one level up from Bruce’s.

Along with worrying about each of his kids for both the same and different reasons, Tony worried about both of them--Bruce, yes, but his brother-in-law especially. Yes, the thunder god had gotten over his meltdown, more or less, and was fine now, if by "fine" you meant, “desperately sad.” The junk food, Stephen King binge and dismal songs continued unabated in the cramped infirmary.

Jane Foster, surprisingly (to Tony, at least), had been a rock, she really had, and not only with Thor, her intended. She pitched in to cheer up the kids, with even Hela seeming to enjoy Jane's rooftop star-watching-and-popcorn-popping sessions, and messy kid-friendly science experiments. Tony went quickly from barely knowing the woman (but finding her bland and vaguely annoying), to moving her to near the top of his personal "Liked and Respected" List.

Introversion would never be something Tony exactly understood, but Jane possessed a quiet, sneaky little sense of humor, a definite point in her favor. Plus, though she seemed slightly flaky for someone with such a ginormous brain (he'd finally just gotten fed up and plunked a pre-programmed StarkPhone into her hand with the words, "Here. Use this, Jane. Please."), she never failed to be caring and kind, especially with Sleip, who was quiet by nature himself, and also needed all the extra attention anyone could manage to shower on him.

Poor Sleip pendulumed between curious and excited (in his understated way) about nearly everything he saw, to nearly catatonic with culture shock. As badly as the other kids (and their dad, admittedly) needed Loki to come back, Sleipnir clearly needed him more. Tony had hired a top-notch occupational therapist, but the poor kid still had a horrible time trying to use his hands for most things he attempted.

It sent Tony into a constant state of slow-burning fury, that this sweet kid, this sweet, loving boy, not only had been deprived of every single thing a kid needs to grow up strong and healthy and whole, he'd been dragged into the sick game of an evil father fucking with his unloved son, to the point that he hadn't been allowed to have hands.

All that because he was Loki's son, and fucking Odin wanted a horse.

School, or even a hired tutor, was for the moment out of the question. To avoid awkward inquiries, Kurt dusted off his teaching certificate and agreed to tutor Sleipnir in language arts. Jane pitched in with helping the boy learn the most basic possible science and math skills, not the easiest job with a kid who, like his _Pabbi_ , thought of everything in terms of magic/not-magic, and who could tell at a glance there were 416 jelly-beans in a bag, but couldn't consistently add two and two to get four.

Jane found it fascinating. She posited a theory both Sleip and Loki thought, and perceived, within a huge number of dimensions at once, and was trying to come with a method to quantitatively test her idea.

But then, Jane was a physicist and constantly lived in a world next door to magic anyway.

Tony, on the other hand, couldn't quite escape being an engineer. In his world 2+2 always came out to 4, no exceptions, and he knew he simply didn't have the patience to decode the workings of his new son's brain. He felt slightly ashamed of the fact. Slightly.

In the end he told himself it was better, anyway, for him not to wear too many hats, to try sticking with his main job of being dad, provider of cuddles, silliness, homework-help and discipline, instead of being He-Who-Gives-the-Homework in the first place.

Wherever they might be, Tony hoped to hell the consciousness-of-Loki-in-an-avatar-body was having a marvelous time toasting Odin's balls to cinders. And that once those aforementioned balls were perfectly cinderized, Loki would quickly come back home, where he was so terribly wanted, needed, missed.

Again and again, Tony woke himself in the night, calling out to his husband, hoping against hope that Loki could somehow hear him. He talked to him during the day, too. The others thought Tony was being eccentric, just talking to himself, but he wasn't, ever. He was talking to Loki.

Sometimes Tony even thought, if he just listened hard enough, he'd hear Loki answer him back again.

Loki never did answer, but the day Jane's friend (the girl with the voice, who never shut up), called Tony a "whack-job," Jane sent her packing back to New Mexico “to look after things.”

And the crowds cheered. To say the least.

It was either that, or Tony personally chucking Darcy out a window in a fit of insane rage.

Maybe not as easily as Loki, his own personal one-and-only-god, had once chucked him, but he'd have still found the act at least temporarily satisfying.

Tony couldn't take it. He really couldn't. He wasn't good either with grief or certain kinds of pressure.

But he still didn't drink.

Not on that night, or any other. It gave him a certain pride, not drinking.

On that particular night, after the kids were in bed, Jane sat out with him out on the balcony, her tiny, woolly-socked-feet propped up on the rail. They each smoked one of Tony's good (and rarely indulged in) Cuban cigars. Jane said she liked it, it was something different--even though it made her hack like a Victorian consumptive with the flu--and that just one wouldn't hurt her impervious _Æsir_ babies.

Tony related to Jane, for her amusement, the story of the fauxlicarrier and the Ironwood, how he'd fallen so completely in love with his beautiful enemy, who he'd discovered (window-chucking aside) had never been his enemy at all.

Jane blew three perfect smoke rings, then turned to him her smile, sweet and more than a little sad.

Tony knew then Jane understood completely, that they were on the same side through this all. He knew, too, that they were family, even more than they were friends, from this point until ever after.

They were two mere mortals who dared to love gods, and no one else knew how that felt.

As if in exchange for Darcy, the next day the tower acquired Dr. Erik Selvig, Loki’s former mind-thrall and builder of the portal to Chitauriland (therefore the near cause of Tony's death, not to mention subsequent onslaughts of bad dreams sufficient to sink battleships).

At first, Tony hadn’t exactly been thrilled to welcome the old man to the tower, friend of Thor and Jane or not, considering, among other things, that the dude tended to pop up wearing less-than-concealing briefs on all occasions and hours of the day and night. He also tried not to hold against Selvig that he'd nearly gotten Tony killed with his loony science-geekery (though he supposed that wasn’t really, ultimately, the guy's fault).

That is, Tony tried, but couldn't really do it.

He might still have continued giving Selvig the cold shoulder, nonetheless, had not that the elderly scientist finally managed to convince Thor to shower, change his clothes and sleep for a bit, and afterward the thunder god seemed much more his old self.

A quieter, sadder version of his old self, but still his old self.

Also, within about two seconds of their meeting Selvig, he somehow had all four kids clinging to his hands and calling him _Afi_ Erik.

“ _Afi_ ” is _Æs_ for “grandpa,” Dad," the kids informed him, still glommed on to the smiling old man.

Tony felt himself chastised. He trusted his kids’ judgment. Someone they liked, he tended to like too.

Selvig, in return, started dressing in quite respectable (and non-gaping, thank the gods) plaid boxers and a slightly despondent gray terrycloth robe, or sometimes even a pair of navy blue sweats that appeared to have been manufactured in the seventies.

Even then, Tony might have resisted, except for the night he struggled out of a painfully deep and exhausted sleep to the sound of Fen sobbing, in that completely heartbroken way he had these days, that sometimes wouldn’t stop until the little boy was absolutely drained.

Tony staggered down the hall, completely lost for a minute, unsure where he was, almost as if he was stuck in a nightmare of his own, one of an endless corridor with innumerable doors, and no way to ever find his weeping son.

Except, suddenly, he stood right outside Fen’s door, open a crack like always, a new little green dragon nightlight glowing on the bedside table.

In the dim green light, Tony could just make out Selvig’s profile, bent over Fen’s bed.

He was seconds away from bellowing, “Get the hell out of my kid’s room!” when he heard the old man say softly, “What has frightened you so, my small _Fenrisulven_?”

Fen must have sent something Tony wasn’t party to, because Selvig replied, “That was indeed a frightening dream, and I can understand well why it upset you, _Fenrisulven_. But your _Pabbi_ can never be lost in the great wood, son, do you know why that is?”

Another pause, another answer Tony couldn’t hear. “Yes, that is right, _min kära, modig varg_. Because your _Pabbi_ left a beacon to shine through the dark and lead him home, just as your little dragon shines on your table to comfort you in the night.”

He patted the little dragon’s head, adding thoughtfully, “For so long I had wondered… he is not a thoughtless or a careless god, your _Pabbi_. All he does contributes to his plans. Why had he left such a large piece of himself in my head? It’s not an easy thing for the mind of a man to hold so much as a splinter of a god inside it. But now I know, _Fenrisulven_. Now I know. He did so to leave a light he might follow home from distant lands in such a case, and how can I grudge him that, poor boy? That is why I have come here, little one, and why I will stay here with you until his return.”

Tony watched Selvig stroke Fen’s bristly but strangely soft hair, and listened to him sing:

_Imse vimse spindel_  
_klättra' upp för trå'n._  
_Ner faller regnet_  
_spolar spindeln bort._  
_Upp stiger solen,_  
_torkar bort allt regn._  
_imse vimse spindel_  
_klättra' upp igen!_

Which turned out to be (for a while Tony was doubtful, Selvig didn’t exactly have perfect pitch) “ _The Itsy, Bitsy Spider_ ” in Swedish (he surmised), and by the time the spider went up the spout again, Fen lay peacefully asleep.

Selvig rose a little stiffly (it was beyond late, and he was by no means a young man, after all), and stood staring up at the ceiling.

Tony poked his head into the room, trying to see what the Swede was seeing.

Which was nothing, unless you had a strange fascination with modern, not-quite-cathedral ceilings.

After about five minutes, when Tony was starting to get antsy, Selvig finally noticed his presence.

“Ah, Mr. Stark. How long have you been here?”

Tony didn’t bother to answer, chances were the old man meant the question more-or-less rhetorically, anyway.

“Is that true?” he asked in return. “What you told Fen?”

“ _Ja_ ,” Selvig answered. _Ja_ , I so believe.” He paused, studying Tony, a slight smile on his weathered, homely face. “You ought to believe also, Mr. Stark. Do you truly imagine he would ever leave you?”

Tony didn’t know what to answer. The lump in his throat was too big to talk around anyway.

“Go see your husband the god,” the old man said. “Talk to him. Talk to your little son. There’s no need to be afraid. Go. Your children are sleeping, and I will hear if they cry out.”

“ _Afi_ Erik, huh?” Tony said, with something like a grin.

“I’ve never had a family,” Selvig answered, “Except, perhaps for my dear girl Jane and her friends. I find it 'doesn’t suck', as Darcy might say.” His smile grew broad and warm. “In fact, I find I like it, Tony. I like it very much indeed. To care and be cared for is, without dispute, a fine thing. Perhaps the finest of all things."

"Science doesn't suck, either," Tony said.

The old man laughed, richly and warmly. "To science and friendship, then, and the return of lost loves from distant lands!"

Tony grinned, setting a hand on Selvig's shoulder. "Since I'm no longer a drinking man, wanna toast that with a cup of pretty damn good hot chocolate?"

"Will there be marshmallows?" Selvig asked.


	22. Fathers and Mothers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki and Ignaas arrive safely at the woodcutter's home. An exhausted Loki has a meaningful dream (or possibly a flashback) about an outing with Logan, soon segueing into his memory of a long-ago encounter with Frigga. Loki then meets Mirjam, his hostess. Let's just say the encounter might have gone better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In Ye Olde Olden Days, glass was highly expensive and tended to come in very small pieces due to cost, difficulty of transportation and because it was much easier both to produce or replace a small pane than it was a big one. To have glass at all was a sign of wealth. Poorer homes tended to have narrow open slits or narrow slits/tiny windows covered by shaved bone or horn. Shutters could be used to keep in heat, maybe  
> with the addition of curtains if you were better off, but either way, the quality of light must have been dismal.
> 
> Wattle-and-daub is literally wickerwork (wattle, or twigs woven between posts) covered with mud (and often straw, for stability and warmth--the daub is the mud). It's an ancient, easily repairable, economical, snug and environmentally friendly, as are thatched roofs, though those do have the two disadvantages of catching fire easily, and of the rodents and insects that shelter in them dropping down on your face while you sleep (one of the reasons for the invention of ceilings). That's one of the real, though less-than-romantic reasons (along with warmth) for canopy or tester beds--the ones with their own wooden ceilings) beds. Think of that next time you see a fairytale princess sleeping.
> 
> For those unfamiliar with the game of baseball, there are nine (or ten--in one league pitchers bat, in the other they don't, and the team has a "designated hitter" to bat in the pitcher's place) starting players, the game is played on a diamond with home plate (where the person "up" also bats) and three bases. One team bats (offense) while the other pitches and fields (catches balls or tries to tag running batters--defense). After three outs on a side they switch, taking turns batting and fielding for nine innings (more if there's a tie at the end of the 9th). All that's far more than you actually needed to know for the sake of the story. 
> 
> The New York Yankees are an American League baseball team based in the Bronx (and are, undoubtedly, despite what Loki says, not "a small representative group of New Englanders"). They play in the new Yankee Stadium, which holds around 50,000 people, about a block from the original Yankee Stadium, which has now been turned into a park.
> 
> Hot dogs definitely fall into the area of "mystery meat," in that no one really knows for sure what they actually contain. Some things in this world are better not to know, even for someone as non-squeamish as myself. To be on the safe(r) side, ingredients-wise, go Kosher.
> 
> What Loki calls sigils (most likely in the sense of "magic symbols"), we'd call insignia, or logos.
> 
> In _A Christmas Carol_ <1843), Charles Dickens describes Ebenezer Scrooge as "solitary as an oyster"
> 
> The baseball flashback--Loki's first excursion out into the real world--is set in the spring of the long, and so far undocumented, stretch between _Do Not Forget Us As We Are_ and _Long Ago, and in Another Country_ , which takes place about nine months later.
> 
> Frigga is spinning not with the better-known spinning wheel, but with a hand-spindle, which looks a bit like a spinning-top with a long handle. She'd drop the spindle to the end of a length of prepared wool, set it spinning to twist the wool into yarn, then wind the new yarn around the spindle itself--then move onto the next length.

* * *

The home where the woodcutter dwelt with his wife appeared much as Loki expected, a trim cottage of white plaster and black half-timbers, a certain prosperity shown in the several small windows with the many even smaller panes of glass leaded into their thick, dark frames. The core of the walls would be wattle and daub, basketry slathered over in mud, a layer of straw for warmth, more plaster, then carefully-hewn boards to finish and stablize the inside. The well-thatched roof would keep in heat, and keep out the snow and rain.

Loki had entered many such snug houses in his time, both when they were new and when they were older, though the sight of another man's dwelling made him homesick for the tower—his own home, that he had fought hard to defend. His very own, especially now that the Ghost in the Wall no longer ruled its environs, seeking always to bring him misery.

Thoughts of the wicked Ghost inevitably led to thoughts of his own sweet, small Edwin, who bore not the least trace of his earlier cruelty. In these days, rather, they shared the fine understanding of kindred spirits, two creatures who could never be loved enough to gain all they needed in the places they found themselves, or in the lives they previously lived, both immeasurably happier for the changes that came upon them.

For all the hatred Loki had felt, at times, from certain others who dwelt within the tower, he could not help but consider his lot improved over former days. He had Tony, _hjarta hjarta hans_ , and his most-loved children—even, soon, his poor, dear Sleipnir, if the harvest he and Hela began had indeed borne the hoped-for fruit. He had his dearest Kurt, best of friends, and his beloved brother Thor. He knew many now who were kind to him, and held him in esteem, as he esteemed them greatly in return.

Loki missed all these with his entire heart, and as much appreciation as he felt for his good host, for his kindness and his aid, he only wished to get back to his true life. Not a weary life of vengeance, if that was what this was, but to his own body, his own home, his own real world where he had his place.

Loki's impatience surged and he could not wait, yet he must wait. Not to wait meant the possible loss of all he'd gained.

Loki had tried hard to balance the measure by which his years in this land compared to his Midgardian days, but in this thing Tony proved only too correct—he could truly not calculate, as his husband might well have asserted, his way through the flimsiness of a damp sack of paper.

 _Uh, I think you mean a wet paper bag, Lok_ , he heard his husband’s laughing voice say in his ear, as closely as if Tony stood just by his shoulder.

Loki’s eyes stung with emotion barely constrained, and made him remember his obstinate, yet much-loved, son, Sherlock, at his small brother’s funeral, crying out, “There’s something in my eye, John! There’s something in my eye!”

Even Sherlock, who Loki knew least of all his children, he missed with a strength sufficient to break his heart, and though he tried hard to hold the emotion in, two fat tears now ran down his cheeks.

“I know it is not what you’re accustomed to, my Lord.”

The woodcutter’s diffident voice demanded his attention; Loki blinked at him through blurred vision.

“But will it not do, if only for a little?”

“Good Ignaas.” Loki dragged his attention back to the present. “Forgive me. I am weary, and in that weakness thought too fixedly upon my family. It is a fine house, and suits me beautifully. Your kindness is great indeed, not only that you grant me the gift of your hospitality, but that you have so freely agreed to shoulder with me the weight of this most-dreadful burden.”

“Now you sport with me, I think, my Lord,” Ignaas answered softly.

“Not at all, my friend. Never, by my life,” Loki said, allowing his host to see the clear truth of every word he had spoken.

All without the cottage revealed care, attention and excellent repair. Beneath the moonlight, the plaster gleamed, the windowpanes flashed light. Despite the wintry weather, steps and pathway appeared swept clean, and the garden had been tidied and mulched against this season of its dormancy. Within, the cottage shone warm and welcoming with fire and lamplight.

“It is lovely and loved of both you and of your beloved,” Loki added quietly. “And for that alone would shine beyond the cold beauty of any heartless palace. Do not by any means store the wood of that evil tree close against your walls, however, dear friend. Or within the barn where your good beasts abide, or yet beside the wood you sell for your livelihood. The old god knows a certain desperation now, feeling himself contained. He will grasp any chance to elude the threat of his burning.”

Ignaas only smiled, touching Loki’s back gently as he had once before, ushering him round behind the cottage, where a sturdy shed of grey stone (empty of so much as a single stick of kindling), stood against an equally sturdy stone fence.

“In August it was full to bursting,” the woodcutter told him, “But the winter came upon us full chill this year.”

“Ah, it is perfect for our need, my friend. Perfect.” Loki tipped back his head, the moth’s-wing touch of snowflakes brushing his cheeks, testing himself to see if one last charm lingered within him for that evening. He believed one did. Not a great one, but a charm of worth, nonetheless.

In the space of a heartbeat, all the evil wood of the Odin-tree vanished safely inside the shed, barring only that which would feed the night’s fires.

Loki fell to hands and knees in the half-melted slush, the nighttime world whirling around him, fast and dizzyingly, like the falling snow.

 

Loki dreamed, foolishly, that he had become the extremely meagre filling to a sandwich made with too-thick bread, cut the way stubborn Tony always _would_ cut his bread, despite Loki having purchased quite an ingenious gadget (he enjoyed the new word, like the foolish Inspector Gadget of whom Tony had informed him, with his silly devices and rapidly-expanding arms and legs—he and the boys laughed mightily at the Inspector’s many animated misadventures, though Hela remained disdainful always).

This gadget was a clear box with slots round the top and sides, which one had only to put the bread within to cut it easily to slices of perfect width with the aid of their serrated bread-knife of marvelous sharpness. Obstinate Tony (who often cut his fingers, then whined pitifully, expecting Loki to instantly heal them) would not use it, and made his sandwiches with great ragged slabs of bread slathered with mustard and piled high with horrid, greasy, spicy-smelling cold cuts (cold cuts of what precisely? Loki often wondered, as the very name sounded both funerary and violent, and the meat itself appeared to come from a beast--or beasts--of no discernible origin).

The other name for Tony’s favorite cold cut was "salami." Loki believed it to be a sort of sausage, thinly sliced, and sausages of another sort, (called hot dogs, he discovered) were served at the arena where the Yankees, a small representative group of New Englanders mightily skilled at the game of baseball, held their gladiatorial combats (though not, apparently, unto death).

Logan, who had brought Loki with him to the game as his guest (not so very long after his recovery, and as his first true excursion outside the tower where Loki had for many weeks hidden himself away), had purchased one of these sausages of hot dog piled with quantities of vile-smelling pickled cabbage that Logan named "sauerkraut," which was truly only a way of saying "pickled cabbage" in the German tongue, and also with nose-searing raw white onion and an oozing brown mustard that smelled quite like piss.

Loki bore, by strength of will, the sight of his friend’s first bite. He could not, by any means, bear the second. He fled to a nearby room of requirement, and despite the utter lack of privacy, had stood leaning over the hand-washing basin ( _the **sink** , goddammit, Lok,_ Tony would laugh), repeatedly splashing cold water into his face so as to prevent shaming himself by being sick.

A terrible roaring, as if of many voices, filled his ears.

Then, as he did so, a man of stinking drunkenness (not feigning, as Volstagg had often feigned in Asgard, to make himself appear weak and foolish, and so not a threat to anyone, or sharp-witted and cruel as Tony sometimes became in those days, when he had too often addressed his scotch, and the spirit overbore his usual kindness), but actually drunk, to the point of staggering.

Loki found the stranger (who bore upon his garments many sigils of those Yankees), utterly disgusting, all the more so because the man not only said to him things not entirely clear to his understanding, but also laid hands upon his person and would not by any means forbear, although Loki asked it of him with a great politeness he altogether did not feel.

Loki would rather have preferred to reduce the mortal to a smear of blood upon the tile for the insult, had not his vow of honor to Director Phillip Coulson, stayed his wrath.

But still the oaf did not forbear, until Loki took hold of his hand, showing in his grip upon it the merest whisper of his true strength, revealing to him also the mad eyes and terrible grin of that other Loki, who might, in at least a hundred ways, have easily destroyed this City of New York, if he truly possessed the will to do so.

Some nights, when he could not find sleep, Loki numbered them each within his head, in hopes of proving, in his own mind, that he was not such a monster as he sometimes feared, that he had shown mercy, that he was not so very worthy of hatred.

He might have turned the _Æther_ and the air to poison, the waters to burning acid, the strong steel girders of the looming towers to mere crumbling chalk, if he chose—but he had not. He had not done these things.

He had, however, once turned a rude driver’s taxi to chocolate ice cream after a journey home from Director Phillip Coulson's office. Then, when the man ran shouting for the police, turned it back to a taxi again. Loki had found the driver’s subsequent consternation wonderfully amusing.

“Do you recall the events of my previous visit?” he hissed then in the room of requirement, direct into the dreadful man’s ear, even as he did so allowing his ordinary Midgardian clothing to melt into proud Asgardian armour. “Do you believe I will not destroy you now, with such thoroughness that any cretins who might hold you dear will never know where to discover your corpse?”

Beyond the walls of the room of requirement, came a second great roar--clearly from the throng, however, and not from Loki's own head or ears. The din only added to his anxiety, though he proudly showed not the least measure of his fear, only dropped the troglodyte upon the unclean tiled floor, altered his clothing again from that of an Asgardian warrior to that of an ordinary Midgardian, and turned with a flourish, to regain his seat beside Logan with head held high, his face adamantine, much like Logan’s claws and remarkable skeleton.

“Hey, Lok, you missed a grand salami!” Logan exclaimed, with more than usual cheer. “Bad timin', bub!”

“I care nothing for your salamis,” Loki replied haughtily, “Nor yet your foul sausages of hot dog. For surely I believed you better than this, Logan, despite your rough demeanor. I thought you would not deceive me by inviting me unto a so-called amusement, which was in fact a horrid test, and which I have now roundly failed.”

He felt the arena swoop around him, and braced a hand against the seat ahead, though the great, crowded, echoing place would not cease its turning. “And what becomes of me after this, my friend?”

The once-treasured word, _friend_ , tasted like bile in Loki's mouth. “Shall I be returned, against all vows, to that place of S.H.I.E.L.D., again to be tortured and humiliated? Logan, why have you done this to me? For what reason? I cannot understand.”

The expression he read on Logan’s face spoke of utter bemusement, but perhaps because of the sheathe of metal that covered the mutant’s skull, shielding his uncomplicated mortal brain, Loki had never been able to detect the concerns of his mind with any great clarity. Logan was in all ways a still and silent man. Even his body gave no betraying sign whatsoever of the words he thought to speak, and had not his friend ever before acted with such kindness toward him, Loki might perhaps have feared him far more than any common Midgardian.

Logan’s eyes narrowed. They were eyes, always, of profound coldness, except at times when he regarded Kurt, and then the undeniable warmth of his heart showed through them.

Loki could not comprehend, still, why Logan would have done him such an unkindness—to lure him here, only to unman and shame him. Why would he do so? Why?

Was it because Kurt was not there, and without his kind presence Logan’s true emotion, his true hatred, revealed itself?

The sheer enormity of his doubt and fear began to make Loki feel sick again, and the ever-despised words formed within his mind, _No one can care for you. They will betray you always. Always._

He ought to have felt rage, but Loki could summon no anger, only deepest dismay. Could it be true? Was it true?

Logan continued to regard him, breathing slowly, no doubt taking in his scent, which by now must reek with the sourness not only of healthy fear but of near panic. All his life Loki had depended on his ability to read the thoughts, wants, intentions of others.

From Logan he read nothing. A perfect blank. Everything Logan felt remained locked tight inside the box of himself. He remained, as respected Mr. Dickens would say, as "solitary as an oyster."

Loki’s distaste for oysters nearly equaled that of his utter hatred for bananas, and at the thought of them, coupled with his terror and doubt, caused his throat to convulse. He pressed a hand to his mouth, the arena narrowing frighteningly to darkness around him.

“Loki. Loki!” Logan called out sharply, sternly, but Loki had passed far beyond response.

Loki had returned to his senses high up in the arena’s iron rafters, and at once felt more at ease, for he was curled within Kurt’s arms, Kurt’s strong tail twined round his waist for security, Kurt’s long trench-coat, which his dear friend wore at times to conceal his special loveliness in unfriendly or uncertain places, laid over him like a blanket.

Loki’s sense of time told him only a few moments had passed since he lost his reason amongst the crowd. He began to feel he had misinterpreted the entire situation, as he so often did. Though still overwhelmed with the deep dregs of his doubt and fear he felt, also, desperately ashamed.

To cover this humiliation he said unto Kurt, with feigned lightness, “One may view the diamond wondrously well from up here, and though there is a breeze, it freshens the air, unlike the closeness below. Also, the noise is far less.”

“I always watch from up here,” answered his friend, with only his usual kindness—and of course, with Kurt, there could be no doubt.

Kurt loved and cared for him always, and Loki would have wagered the moon and stars—nay, the universe entire!—upon that truth.

“Though, of course, so as not to be dishonest, I do buy a ticket. It was my ticket you used today, since I thought I wouldn’t be joining Logan.” Kurt gave his bright, kind smile. “The best laid plans, _ja_ , my dear, foolish friend? Why did you have a panic attack down there, Lo?”

“I am foolish,” Loki admitted, but so terribly off balance, so terribly confused, he could not even think why. “But I did not panic, I only felt faint for a moment. They serve dog as a… a... snack in this terrible place, Kurt.”

Loki felt a great fondness for dogs, it was true, and dearly hoped Tony would allow him someday to keep one in the tower. Not a great, fierce dog like the wolf-dogs used for hunting in Asgard, or yet a gentle giant like the lazy (though ferocious-appearing) mastiffs the nobles kept to slumber at their feet, but a foolish, funny little dog that would follow him about the tower, or sit upon his lap when he felt less than himself.

As a boy, when Loki had not hidden himself from his so-called father’s ire in the library, he had often removed himself to hide in the kennels, where the vast, wet tongues of the mastiffs would lave away his tears and he might bury the face of his shame within their deep, dark pelts.

“Honestly, they aren’t actually made from dogs, Lo,” Kurt was informing him, in quite his usual calm and comforting voice. He wore what Tony called a “lab coat,” slightly stained with chemicals, over a very ordinary shirt and trousers. Loki fingered his friend’s disordered curls, which were somewhat crushed, and knew Kurt must lately have been wearing the drab hat he used to conceal his lovely (and much-loved) blue face from the eyes of those-who-hated.

“I’ve interrupted your classes,” Loki said shakily, with great contrition. ”I am so sorry. So very sorry, _hjarta minn_.”

“I’d actually finished for the day,” Kurt answered, still smiling, “So put your mind at ease, _mein Freund_. I was just about to hang up my lab coat and pop over to see how you were enjoying not only your first real game, but your first real outing beyond the tower. Not so very well, hmn?”

“I am tedious and foolish,” Loki answered.

“You are not.” Kurt squeezed his hand. “You weren’t to know. Don’t feel ashamed, Loki, or beat yourself up about this. You were just in a little over your head. There were too many people, too much noise, for your first time--and Logan, though he knew you’d drifted into deep waters, didn’t know how to reassure you.”

“I have been in war,” Loki said bitterly. “Suffered grievous wounds with scarcely a blink of my eyes. Dealt death. Why were the wretched things given the name 'hot dogs', then, if they are made of other meats? To name them so scarcely seems good advertisement for the product. And what meats do in fact contribute? They smelled exceeding vile.”

“Beef and/or pork is the general consensus,” Kurt answered, laughing merrily. “And I’d stick with that consensus, if I were you, Lo. It’s a question into which it may be best not to delve too deeply.”

Loki rested his head against Kurt’s chest then, against the slow comforting beat of his friend’s heart, and watched the tiny Men of New England run about the field. “I enjoy it better up here with you,” he said. “I like the quiet.”

After a time, he said to Kurt, "Pray send to Logan, though, my most sincere apologies if I have interfered with his enjoyment of the pastime in my ignorance, and have earned his disdain. The eating of dogs is said to be a thing we… the _Jöt_ … low creatures do.”

“Low creatures?” Kurt asked, and sighed. “Oh, my poor Loki. My dear, lovely, brilliant, injured friend. What was it we’ve discussed again and again?”

“But your blue is warm and beautiful,” Loki protested, “And mine…”

“Is wonderful too,” Kurt interrupted, “And equally beautiful. You are loved and cared for, Loki, and I will tell you so again and again until you’re forced to believe it. So will everyone who cares for you.”

“I always believe it, even against my better judgment, when I am with you,” Loki said, and laid his head once more, against Kurt’s chest.

Some moments passed before he asked his friend. “Kurt, Logan said the oddest thing. He spoke of a “grand salami.” What on earth has Tony’s odourous but much-loved luncheon meat to do with a baseball game?”

“I was confused by that too, when first I heard the term,” Kurt answered, laughing. “It’s actually slang, an affectionate nickname for a ‘grand slam’—for when three players already stand on the bases, and their next teammate at bat hits a home run, allowing all four to make it home.”

“And four points are scored, which is a fine thing for the team. The Men of New England accomplished this thing?”

“The Yankees,” Kurt corrected gently. “And yes, that’s what I heard. We were listening in the anatomy lab as we worked. It seemed a little odd to cheer, given the location, but we did.”

“And that is why the crowd roared?” Loki asked. “This… cheering. It was a noise of approbation, not of fury?”

“A grand slam doesn’t happen often, and is considered a very exciting thing.”

“I begin to understand,” Loki said cautiously, but he knew he understood nothing. Had he misunderstood, also, the actions of the man in the room of requirement? Had the mortal merely attempted to embrace him in drunken excess of fellow-feeling in his joy at his heroes’ fine accomplishment? Loki had not thought that the case, but what if he had revealed his other face in grievous error? What if Director Phillip Coulson learned of his mistake?”

He began to shake with terror.

He had stood on the verge of breaking his vow. He had broken his vow, had he not, by laying hands upon the man and speaking threatening words to him? He had, once more, used his innate might for ill. He would be punished again.

Shaking with ever-increasing force, Loki saw, in that moment, the reality of how far he had fallen, first when he learned of his heritage, then again when he let loose of Odin's golden spear, Gungnir.

Had truth and the abyss conspired together to steal all he possessed: honour, courage, lineage, cleverness, strength? Had he ever possessed the least wisdom, who was now a low, craven, nameless, ignorant, weak, broken and monstrous thing?

“Lo, please,” Kurt soothed—ever so gentle, so kind to him. “Please don’t upset yourself, _lieber Freund_. In my holy book, it's written, ‘therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.’ We are all, in every part of our lives, upon that journey toward wisdom and understanding. Not one of us knows everything, and everyone who knows you can't help but be aware how terribly confusing this new Midgardian life must sometimes be. Tony and I will explain the event to Director Coulson, who knows a little of your past, and why being grabbed like that would be so alarming to you. He’ll understand.”

Loki was not certain even he understood. He felt dull, and shattered to a million pieces, and as if nothing made sense, the last bit of pleasure in the day lost to him. In the end Kurt texted apologies to Logan, then bamfed him safely home to the tower, where he might hide in peace.

Even when the children came to him on the sofa, and lay against him, and sent their great love directly into his head (while Kurt explained the day's happenings to Tony in a hushed voice, which Loki could nonetheless hear perfectly well), did he feel lovable.

It was only when Logan came by later in the evening, shooed the children away and thumped himself down heavily by Loki’s side did the clouds began to lift. Logan was quite capable of mockery, but the little he could sense told him Logan had not come to mock him. Not with cruelty, at least.

“Hot dog, huh?” Logan asked, then gave his deep, harsh laugh. “Yer an idiot, bub.”

Loki had opened his mouth to agree when Logan reached out with his thick, almost grotesquely muscled arms, pulling Loki against his barrel chest so tightly that it hurt, holding him so fast that even with his great strength he could not have escaped, even had he wanted to.

Loki did not want to escape. He knew the meaning of that embrace, even before Logan spoke to him.

“Yer old man is an asshole. I thought that when I met him, now I think it with interest. Whatever shit he said to ya all yer life, kid, that wasn’t the fuckin’ truth. Yer head already knows that, now do us all a favour, let yer heart in on the secret.” He squeezed Loki even tighter, his huge hand spreading flat between Loki’s shoulder blades, a light touch, almost, caring and comforting despite his rough-toned words. “Ya admit the Elf loves ya, right? Well, I love ya too. Get that thought into that idiot genius noggin of yours. I love ya, and I don’t give up. Ever. Even if ya gave up on yerself I wouldn’t ever give up on you. I love ya like a dad would, if I was any kinda dad material, which I’m likely not, but I can still love ya just that way, boy.”

For the first time, perhaps even for the first in his life, held tight within the arms of that silent, brutal, great-hearted man, Loki felt certainty.

He felt anchored—in his body, in himself, even within this strange Realm of Midgard.

In his years as a prince, as a god, in his earlier years upon Midgard, he had been presented with many fine gifts, but that which Logan gave him that day he numbered among the finest.

He had a father—not Laufey, perhaps, the father of his flesh, slain, to Loki’s greatest dismay, in a fever of rage and pain, madness and gross misunderstanding—but a father of the heart, who cared for him. Who pledged to always love him. What greater gift could he receive?

 

Loki lay still in the narrow bed, in a low-ceilinged room that once been the boyhood chamber, he now knew, of Ignaas, his savior and recent friend. This cottage, fine and well-tended, had once been cottage of the woodcutter’s parents, and his grandparents and great-grandparents before them. It bore the pleasant weight of family and history with its walls, lighter than the sense of history to which he was accustomed, yet also kinder.

The thick eiderdown beneath him and the down-stuffed comforter above enveloped him in enjoyable warmth, and for this time, at least, Loki felt content to rest and drift a little. This body he now inhabited, his own creation, wore down he knew. It could not last, any more than the first six had lasted him, though this quiet time helped somewhat to preserve its integrity. The others had not fared well at all, in the cold and the heat and the weather, with little to sustain them, they weakened, they sickened, but perhaps in this good house, with food to nourish him, and sleep…

He shivered as the coverlet whisked away, a sudden chill striking his legs, for he wore only one of the woodcutter’s nightshirts, and though the differences in their builds left the shirt quite loose about Loki’s far-less-bulky shoulders, his greater height allowed the garment only to reach to the middle of his thighs.

A sudden premonition made him fling up an arm, barely in time to spare his throat, as a wire of burning pain seared the arm just below the wrist, cutting nearly to the bone. The instincts of a lifetime saved him from a second, more vicious blow, and he flung himself off the far side of the bed, the coverlet pooled round his feet, already blooming red with the violent spill of his blood.

Loki felt weak, disoriented, yet aware enough to see a madwoman occupied his room, sparsely-dressed and wildly disheveled, her buxom form blocking the only door.

In one hand she bore a wicked knife, of a kind used for the butchery of cattle, in the other a half-carved stick of firewood.

At the further end of the stick Loki glimpsed small, half-formed arms, brutish shoulders bearing the suggestion of armour, a thick neck, a head—and on the head, a bearded face, the face of a one-eyed old man, its mouth open wide, as if it screamed out words of purest rage.

Loki saw in an instant what must a have happened: a young man idly whittling by the fire as his good wife mended or spun, carving cunning toys or trifles the man sold about the town as he traveled through his rounds, or perhaps gave away with small bundles of wood to eager hands of the poorer children. Ignaas the Woodcutter, a good man, a kind man, who disliked for his hands to be idle, the face of the old king taking quick, though unintended, shape beneath his busy knife.

The sweet young woman spinning, spinning... spinning out the thread of life…

“All woman are _Nornir_ , you know, my son,” his mother, Frigga, said to Loki once, as they sat by the fire in her chambers, Loki sharpening to razor edges his throwing-knives, the goddess casting out her spindle, twirling, twirling before she drew it up again. Hers was a beautiful spindle, which Loki had carved for his mother with his own two hands as a gift for her Naming Day, in the days when Narfi and Vali, his much-loved boys, had grown so great within his belly that, even with all the glamours in the world, he could not move easily about the palace, but kept much to himself.

Frigga who had never once celebrated Loki’s own Naming Day (though, as he now knew, he had been born the son of the son of her own blood, and he supposed she knew the day well).

He had found himself surprised, after his disgrace, that she kept this spindle still, or used it.

“In our own ways,” Frigga added.

 _Do all of you bring judgment and misfortune?_ Loki wanted to ask, for not so much time had passed since the restoration of his burned-out sight, and his journey through the Northlands with Thor. Far more recent still was the restoration of himself and Frigga into the circles of one another’s lives, and in discourse with all but his brother, bitterness still weighed heavy on Loki's tongue.

Still, he thought of Sigyn, his Little Mouse, gentle, mild and loyal, and forbore to say the words to his mother.

“In your own way,” Loki repeated in dull tones.

Frigga glanced his way sharply. “By the power of death and life we hold within our wombs,” she answered in something of a scolding voice.

Anger uncoiled within him, striking swifter than any serpent. “And what of the power within _my_ womb, mother? What of life? What of death? What is my place in your cosmography? Am I of the _Nornir_ as well?”

“You are of the _seiðmenn/em >, Loki, as you well know,” Frigga said. “You give birth to death, and what you hold of life within you lies beyond my understanding. You ought to have died within the heights of the mountain.”_

“I wished that I would, heartily, many times,” Loki answered coldly. “Perhaps I wish it still.”

They regarded one another for a long while, until Frigga’s eyes, if not her lips, held her apology.

Loki could not remain angry with her. Aside from Thor, this woman (who loved his enemy, always, better than she loved him), was all he had within the Nine Realms, and the depths of his loneliness overwhelmed the tatters of his pride. Loki knelt upon the hearth and laid his head on her knees, and Frigga stroked his hair with gentle fingers, lovingly, soothingly.

 _Do not tell Odin of this, I beg of you, mother,_ Loki wanted to plead, _Do not tell him of my weakness, my surrender, my need. He will only laugh at me_.

Yet he knew she would tell.

As if it had heard Loki’s thoughts, the homunculus, the half-carved doll, the avatar of Loki's wicked never-father, flung back its wooden head and pealed forth a cruel laughter far, far too enormous for its shrunken size, while the mouth of the poor madwoman opened and opened, flames flickering at the back of her overstretched throat, and in her eyes.

“Mirjam, Mirjam,” Loki pleaded—for who else might she be?—“Please, dearest lady, by the name of all you love, throw the stick upon the fire now. Throw it, and all may be well. Oh, sweet Mirjam, hear me and throw it, I beg of you!”

But Loki did not know if Mirjam, so loved by the woodcutter, could heed him still. Had she, poor mortal woman (her head filled up with those terrible flames, so easily compelled by a wicked god, as any mortal, man or woman, might easily have been), now moved beyond that place where she might, once more, turn safely back for home again?

Loki did not know, he only wished heartily that he did.

He did know, at all costs, he must restore Ignaas's sweet Mirjam at once to herself, or perish in the attempt.


	23. First Star on the Pyre

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony Stark is a pushover (but a loving dad). After many trials, Odin's reign of terror goes up in flames. Literally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My sister and I played the bunkbed game with great enthusiam as young kids and, it must be said, managed never to hurt ourselves. See, it's not dangerous (it totally is)!
> 
> "Tollers" was C.S. Lewis's nickname for J.R.R. Tolkien in the days of their friendship. Mr. Lewis was known as "Jack" to friends and family. Charn was the decayed city that was the original home of Jadis, the White Witch, as depicted in _The Magician's Nephew, which I am reminded is the first Narnia book (under the current numbering system)._

* * *

If the guest suite possessed a second advantage over the penthouse, that advantage had to be the much higher ceilings in the bedrooms, and after the night of Fen’s terrible dream, the three brothers declared that they not only wanted to share one room until the penthouse was refurbished, they wanted a triple-high bunk bed, with a ladder to climb. Tony suspected Jöri of being the ringleader on that one—after all, he’d also been the one who’d campaigned with truly Lokiesque persuasiveness for an actual double-decker couch after the kids saw _The Lego Movie_ ) 

Tony, without his husband to rein him in and list (probably with bullet points for emphasis) the many reasons why three lively children and a triple-decker bunk might not be the wisest of wise ideas, naturally found himself caving to the wiles of Mr. Silvertongue, Jr.

“I will wager you double my next allowance,” Hela said thoughtfully, considering the structure (of which Tony was more than just a little trifle jealous himself—it just looked so damn fun), “That one of my brothers experiences the breaking of a bone within a sevenday.”

Tony’s daughter seemed to be displaying something of an Asgardian hangover on her vocabulary. More than that, Hela hadn’t herself since her return, not quite the dauntless and resilient girl he knew, in ways beyond even what her obvious concern for Loki would explain. It wasn’t even that she seemed older—if anything the reverse appeared to be true.

Whatever the deal was, Hela, since that afternoon at Phil’s, wouldn’t open up to him, and Tony, in his worry, had even tried pumping Pepper and Natasha, Jöri and Kurt for further info, with the thought that one of them might be a likely confidante, but if that was the actual case, none of them seemed willing to spill—to him, at least.

Tony hated the thought of his daughter being in pain, and himself unable to help her—at the same time he suspected the only one who _could_ help, _really_ help, lay soulless and still four floors below them.

Meanwhile, he had so much he wanted to say to Hela, even more he wanted to ask, but instead they moved into a kind of holding pattern with each other, with his daughter trying to fake being the person she'd been pre-Realm Eternal, and Tony… well, just let it be said he had more than a few things to prove to all his kids.

“No way,” Tony scoffed. “They’re perfectly safe.”

Hela did a perfect Loki single-eyebrow-raise. “Says the man who zooms around the city in a red-and-yellow metal suit firing repulsors out of his hands and feet.”

Tony considered that his daughter had a point.

“Here,” Hela said, passing him one of the three fairly good-sized rolls of canvas she held cradled in her arms. “Make yourself useful. Hang that. It’s Fen’s. He’s in the bottom bunk. Just slide the rod into the pocket at the top like you were hanging a curtain. The hooks are already in the wall.”

“You’re under the impression that I’ve ever hung a curtain? It’s Iron Man, remember, not Interior Decorator Dude.”

That one got him a full-on eye-roll. Her _Pabbi_ , unrivaled anywhere for the quality of his eye-rolls, would have been proud.

Tony at least wasn’t quite so stupid as to say anything to that effect.

“Hey, I’ll figure it out,” he put in hastily. “Chill, please?”

Five minutes later, both of them stepped back, checking out the effect of the three canvases they’d just hung beside the boys’ beds: a slightly-fantastical forest scene for Fen inside the bottom bunk, a coral reef alive with fish for Jöri—and for Sleipnir, their family, complete with Sherlock (looking somewhat less frosty than usual) and, to Tony’s surprise, little Wilhelm, exactly as he’d been in Avalon, which was to say a green-eyed version of Tony as a Kindergartner. When he looked closer, he realized Narfi and Vali were in the picture too, at the back of the lineup.

“What Sleip loves best,” Hela said softly. “Our family. Thank you for being so good to him, Daddy.”

“You break my heart, Empress,” Tony told her.

Hela slipped her hand into his, weaving their fingers together.

“It won’t be good,” Tony said. “But we’ll make it. You know that, right, Hela? Even if…?”

“Even if,” his daughter echoed. “Yes, Daddy, I know.”

That evening, as Tony had been trying to concentrate on completing his latest mound of paperwork from Pepper, he’d detected a weird thumping noise coming from down the hall.

When he went to investigate, cracking open the door a half inch, he discovered The Three Musketeers had invented a fun new game. It involved launching themselves off the top bunk and across the room at the dresser, using their momentum to slide down its length in their stocking feet.

The goals appeared to be three-fold, not to: A) undershoot and miss the dresser completely; B) overshoot and slam into the wall behind the dresser; C) slide too fast and pitch over the end of the dresser onto their heads.

All three boys were laughing like loons.

They’d been bid goodnight half an hour before, and were supposed to be tucked up all snug in their beds, with visions of sugarplums, etc…

Tony watched them for a minute, grinning, wishing he’d had brothers. Not that it would have made a real difference, he guessed. Howard would still have been Howard and insisted on certain behaviors, none of them particularly enjoyable. Maybe what he really wished was that he could be a child himself for half an hour, and play with his boys, joining in the way only a kid can. If he tried that game now, he;d probably end up in traction.

Tony found Hela sitting on a big cushion on the living room floor, the new chess set she’d received as a late Christmas gift laid out on an ottoman ("Both a footstool and a historical empire!" as Thor might say). The intricate pieces were hand-cut from Irish crystal, the board made from hand-blown glass inlaid with semi-precious stones. Even as a billionaire Tony couldn’t calculate what something like that would cost, not only for the materials, but for the incomparable craftsmanship.

Loki, of course, had made the damn thing for their daughter. By hand, not by magic.

Tony’s stomach ached with missing his husband. He needed Loki. _Needed_ him.

He had to force himself to go down to the infirmary twice a day, and the only thing that made him do it, that made him sit beside the silent form with the machines making it breathe, was the thought that little Edwin, his son, might be still able to hear his voice. He knew full well that Loki wasn’t there with him.

Their friends thought there was something wrong with him, beyond mere grief and worry--that he'd started cracking up, acting full-on weird.

Happy had told them about Chicago, of course. They worried. Tony took those Chi-town events as Loki doing the best he could in the middle of a brain-shredding situation, to make sure his husband happened to be in the right place at the right time to connect with Sleip.

Which he had done, and now Sleipnir seemed to be doing beautifully, and in a little while Loki would be back, and he would do beautifully too.

Tony had to tell himself that. He had to repeat those words to himself again and again.

When Hela, earlier in the evening, had translated the bedtime story Tony had been reading the kids—it was _The Wind in the Willows_ , chosen by Fen, who always liked stories about animals best—from English into _Æs_ , Tony found himself amazed, realizing how many of the words he actually understood, as if something had suddenly decided to click in his brain and make sense of a language he’d more-or-less been hearing non-stop for most of the past two years.

He was even more amazed by how much English Sleipnir had already picked up. Sleip remained a fairly quiet kid—not surprising for someone who’d never spoken aloud in his life—but then, Jöri tended to be on the quiet side too. Even Loki—though Tony had missed it at first, behind the shield of his husband's sass and eloquence, could be seen as something of an introvert. All the things he loved best (besides Tony himself)—his art, music, writing, scholarship, love of books, even his running—were solitary pursuits.

It had hit Tony fairly early on that while Loki loved spending time with family and friends, he tended not to care much for parties unless acting a part, the way he’d slip into the persona of Bowiesque surrealist artist Lo Stark for his gallery do’s, or morph into an almost frighteningly suave Loki Stark, who was almost nothing like regular, at-home-Loki, for the soirees he went to as Tony’s spouse.

Or the witty, ferocious, "bag of cats" Loki’d turned into for the attack on New York. At least, before recent events, he had, however slightly, seemed to begin to put that somewhat behind him.

Tony had come across him laughing over his laptop one day.

“It is not funny,” Loki giggled. “It is wicked in the extreme!”

He’d shown Tony a picture of himself in Stuttgart, tricked out in full Asgardian armor, complete with helm. Someone had photoshopped in what looked like a bunch of high-end handbags draped over Loki’s arms.

A second picture showed the same shot, minus the purses but with the addition of a large, smiling, golden dolphin balanced on each of Loki’s armored shoulders.

Tony had given him a look.

“You see? I am burdened with glorious purses!” Loki snickered.

Suddenly, Tony laughed out loud, the light bulb having switched on over his head. “And burdened with glorious porpoises, I presume?”

Almost five whole minutes had passed before Loki withdrew to some distant, hidden part of the tower Tony still hadn’t managed to track down, to do that thing he did instead of crying.

That same heartbroken response, Tony knew, that often hit his husband--even though the whole thing in Germany had been staged, an act put together with a couple old friends from Loki’s days of defying the Nazis. He’d hurt no one in Stuttgart—except that one guy he’d sent ass-over-teakettle with a stylish-but-powerful swing of his scepter (Tony had to admit to replaying the clip of that one more than once—whatever the intent, it was sexy as fuck).

“Do you think he was badly injured?” Loki would ask, his forehead in worried furrows, now and then. “I needed to appear brutal and thoughtless for the sake of verisimilitude, but I experienced a touch of stage fright, and perhaps did not soften the blow as I intended. Would it be possible for your minions to discover the truth?”

Every time his husband talked about his “minions,” Tony pictured the big-eyed little chicken-nugget dudes, because, well, who wouldn’t?

All he’d say, though, was, “Done and done, Lok.”

The truth was, Tony discovered, the guy _had_ been pretty badly hurt. Not dead or permanently in a wheelchair, but hurt. Since he was German, not American, he wasn’t going to be bankrupted by the costs of his medical care, but the Stark Foundation made a generous contribution towards his suffering and time-off-work and, according to his “minions,” the man was now back on the job and doing great, with bragging rights for having gone up against a god and lived to tell the tale.

Tony would always wrap Loki up in his arms then, holding and kissing him, murmuring distractions, until his husband’s busy mind latched onto another subject.

 

From the boys' room came a crash, then a loud wail.

Hela glanced up from her chessboard. “You realize, as a parent, you’re meant to stop these things before they become an issue?” she said.

“It looked fun,” Tony answered, which was a pretty damn flimsy excuse. “It made me wish I had brothers to play with. Why don’t you play with them, Hela? Be a kid for once.”

“Perhaps…” Hela picked up her black queen, exploring its faceted surfaces with her fingertips. “Perhaps, if I actually _was_ a child, intellectually, I would do so. Unfortunately, the nickname you gave me is only too apt. I am not a child, only ‘childlike.’ I need to get back to work, Dad. Mortals suffer, and I’ve spent too many days being idle.”

“I kinda meant to ask you about that. It felt a little awkward.”

“A boon, then?” Hela set the queen down carefully in its place on the board. “Would you come with me now and then, as _Pabbi_ did? So that I don't feel lonely?”

“Whatever you need, Empress of my Heart,” Tony answered.

He stacked his papers more-or-less in order on the coffee table. “Maybe time to check on your bros, huh?”

“It’s most likely only a sprain, not a break,” his daughter informed him. “I haven’t won our wager. Yet.”

“I love you lots, wonderful girl,” Tony said. “That was a nice thing you did for the boys. The paintings, I mean.”

“I wish that I was an artist, like _Pabbi_ , instead of merely a draftswoman,” Hela told him.

“Whatever you are, they’re beautiful paintings. The boys love them. And, as previously mentioned, I love you, Hela.”

His daughter smiled her gorgeous smile—gods, so much like Loki’s Tony's heart shattered to a million pieces—and answered, “And I love you too, Dad. Ever and always.”

“Ever and always,” Tony repeated.

It was a thing Loki said.

* * *

By no power he possessed could Loki compel his hostess to throw the carved stick upon the fire. With every trick he tried, the terrible voice of Odin countered him—for given a mouth, the old god _would_ speak, and the words from that mouth remained as dire, as hurtful, as controlling now as they had been all Loki's life.

The best Loki might achieve was to hold Mirjam in stillness with his _seiðr_ as gently as he might, and murmur soft words to her, calming the poisonous blossoms of fear that unfurled inside her true mind.

And so they waited, Loki’s hurt arm speckling blood upon the floor, making his head feel light, the house growing cold and colder around them, hoping against hope for the woodcutter’s early return.

But Ignaas did not return early from his time in the nearby village, selling his stores of untainted wood, his ordinary bundles of logs and kindling.

Night fell, and the room became dark, before the small window revealed the flicker of the woodcutter's lantern in the yard. The latch of the front door scraped, then Ignaas called, "Mirjam, why has the fire gone out?"

Loki listened to the striking of his host's knife against his flint. In a moment or so followed the hot exhalation of a lantern catching light, somewhere beyond the room where they--ensorcelled and sorcerer--awaited his presence.

“Mirjam? Dearest wife?” the woodcutter called out. “My Lord Loki?”

“In the chamber where I slept,” Loki answered, in a ragged voice. Every part, within him and without, hurt. “Harm has befallen us, my friend.”

“Mirjam!” Ignaas rushed into the room, taking in first the sight of Loki in his blood-stained nightshirt, then his disheveled and half-clad wife, with the great knife gripped so tight in her hand her knuckles shone white as moons.

“Fear not that I have betrayed you, Ignaas, in any particular. Only take that stick you see Mirjam hold speedily away from her hand,” Loki commanded. “Pass it with haste to me, then quickly as you can manage, kindle a fire upon the hearth and throw the _fjandinn_ thing in. I beg of you, my friend, make this happen, or surely we will soon perish. Listen not, also, to the lying words the old king will spill into your ears.”

The woodcutter paused only to exchange a brief look with him, then swiftly did as Loki bade him.

Mirjam cried out as the carving left her hand, sinking to her knees upon the floor, the madness gone from her face in the instant of the taking, but that same fair face pressed down into the bare, rough boards as she wept out her shame.

“I did not mean it, my Lord,” the sweet young woman sobbed to Loki. “On my honor, I did not mean it. Never, by my will, would I seek to harm you.”

Loki wrapped his hand around the malevolent small visage, stifling its cruel speech with the flesh of his palm, though the sensation of having been bitten, deeply and savagely, coursed through skin and muscle, into the very marrow of his bones. Just when he began to think he could bear the pain no longer, Ignaas wrested the stick away from him.

This rough image of Odin fell upon the flames with a great and terrible roar—a cry of deepest agony, deeper rage--that rang and rang in Loki’s ears until he cried out in turn with the pain clanging through his head, though it seemed by their blank looks his host and hostess heard nothing.

He kept to his feet only by clinging to the bedpost, already calculating what must come next.

No more of that accursed wood must enter the good home of Mirjam and Ignaas. This was not a task, after all, to be accomplished slowly, stick by stick, over time, as Loki had hoped. No, it must be done at once, in this one night, and then be complete for all time. The influence of the old, cruel king would be otherwise too malign, dripping a slow poison into their ears and their hearts, destroying this innocent husband and wife (whose only crime had been to befriend a lost god), until nothing of joy, health or love remained to them.

“As I have been destroyed, through all my years by his side,” Loki murmured.

Ignaas raised his tear-stained face. He held Mirjam cradled in his arms, and for a moment Loki feared great harm had indeed befallen her—but then he saw that her chest rose and fell with the normal passage of breath, and her lovely face appeared peaceful.

Mirjam was only very tired, and she slept.

“She is well, she is well,” Loki gasped, scarcely able to speak in his relief. He stooped, raising his good hostess gently from her husband’s hold, laying her with tenderness upon the bed he himself had lately occupied, spreading the coverlet over her with greatest possible care. The bedding was not clean now, or spotless white as it had been, but it would nonetheless warm her chilled body.

Not bothering to dress, hardly able to bear a moment’s delay, Loki staggered out through the kitchen doorway, into the cobbled yard that lay to the back of the cottage, his Craft flinging open the door of the low and sturdy shed.

A gesture and the wood flew out toward him through the snow-filled air, as if his spell had gone astray, as if every log and stick meant to attack and beat him senseless, but Loki raised his arms, wrists crossed before his face, and shouted further words out into the wind, fueling their power by the strength contained in the slow-spilling stream of his blood.

The wood drifted down to the ground along with the snow, arranging its own form to that of a funeral pyre, a threat implicit in the shape it made of itself upon the cobblestones.

“Do you believe I care, Never-Father?” Loki shouted into the wind. “Do you possibly imagine that matters in these days, when you have taken from me everything I have owned and called dear? My dear father, your own son, noble Hodr. My _Pabbi_ , Laufey King, who once cared for me, my _Jötunn_ people and my heritage. Better to live an hour, loved, in the land of my ancestors than to live a thousand years despised by you, Allfather. You took my young sons, my dear Sigyn, my sight. You made me a plaything for your malice, and also for Baldr, your corrupt favorite. You could not so much as allow me my own happiness far from your hall, but must hound and worry at me, again and again, never allowing to me the least peace.

"Never content, you made beasts of my beautiful and much-loved children. If you had only let me be, I would never again have darkened your hallways, or sought to enter Asgard, where nothing remains for my delight. Never again would my name have been spoken. You might have stricken every record of me from the histories and I would not have complained.”

Loki fell to hands and knees upon the icy stones, just as he had done in the night past.

“If I could only understand, Grandfather. If I could only understand. I was blood-of-your-blood, and you always knew it. I was blood-of-your-blood, yet nothing to you. Was it my father’s defiance of your will? That half my heritage came of those you defeated, and broke, and called monsters, as you would ever name my little ones monsters?”

Loki sat back on his heels, wiping half-frozen tears from his cheeks with the nightshirt’s thin sleeves.

“I never was a monster, Grandfather Odin,” he said softly. “Neither was I evil, nor brought evil down upon my head by my own doings. You engineered terrible events to injure me, and still I loved you. I worshiped you. For what you have done, you ought to know shame beyond that ever known by mortal or immortal, and yet you admit to not the least shame, and never will do so.”

Loki drew in a long, slow breath.

“Do you imagine you have another threat to hold against me, after all these days, months, years? I will destroy you, and yet grieve for you. I will sorrow and weep many tears, not for what we were, perhaps, but for what we might have been, if only your choices were other than what you made them. Perhaps, in time, I may even find some story exists in my memory that speaks well of you. I will tell it to my children then, in hopes they may feel less shame that your foul blood pumps within them.”

Still sitting there, on his heels, alone in the cold courtyard, Loki cupped his hands and spun a cool and silvery song, _seiðr_ -carried, out into the dark.

Slowly, between those hands, a ball of white fire formed, growing paler and hotter with every moment’s passage, until even to glance at its light left a silver afterimage floating in Loki's vision.

Loki lurched to his feet, the ball cupped now in his right hand, merrily spitting sparks--but as he drew back his arm to fling it, hard as he could, into the heart of piled wood and set all blazing, two other hands touched his back with gentle affection.

Who else could those hands belong to but Ignaas the Woodcutter, his savior and friend, and woodcutter’s bride, Mirjam, who had never, in herself, meant to harm him by thought or deed? Their gloves pressed a warm and slightly-scratchy weight against the thin cloth covering Loki’s shivering skin, and he knew, even if they never met again after this night, he would love those two particular mortals for as long as he lived.

"Allow us, my Lord Loki,” Ignaas said, in his quiet, kind voice. “Allow us to serve you, this last time, at least.”

“The fire is too hot,” Loki said. “It will surely burn you, my friend.”

Mirjam held up a tin pail by its wire handle. “It is the bucket we use to serve Hanne his hot bran mash at the end of a cold day’s work.” Her face flushed, a pretty pink spreading across her dimpled cheeks as she turned her bright smile to him. “It was all I could think of, that sprang easily to hand.”

Loki found himself grinning back at her, a sudden elation sizzling through his veins. He found himself, in truth, not in the least alone. These friends of the heart would help him, even though he had known them for such a brief time. He need not be lost, or cursed, for setting the blaze, either for himself or down his line.

“Be careful, dear ones,” Loki cautioned. “The fire is both heavier and livelier than it seems. Ignaas, hold on with her. Tightly, both of you, until the flame is released.”

When both the woodcutter and Mirjam had a firm grip on the handle, Loki spilled his ball of fire into the pail, where it skittered about the tin bottom, chirruping happily to itself.

“Oh, does it sing?” Mirjam asked. “I cannot hear the words, but I know them. I do!”

“Now, my Lord?” Ignaas asked, then suddenly smiled. “Oh, yes, I hear them also, my wife! I hear them, and they are as familiar to me as a song I’ve known the words to all my years.”

 _You have_ , Loki thought, _Oh, my friends you have. They sing to you as you sleep every night._

Other words returned to him, from a book he and Jöri had read together, when his son was a little younger, one from a series of books Kurt had recommended which, though they spoke much of Kurt’s man-god in oblique ways, were wise also in the ways of magic.

“In our world a star is a huge ball of flaming gas," the author, Mr. Lewis, had a rather tiresome character say, to which that boy received the answer, “Even in your world, my son, that is not what a star is, but only what it is made of.”

Tony never would understand the difference between those things, yet Loki hoped that he would, someday, if he only explained again and again. He himself could not recall why the words struck upon his heart with such familiarity—until, after they finished the series, Kurt showed him a different book, which contained within it pages a letter written by Mr. Lewis to his friend Mr. Tolkien:

_My Dear Tollers,_

_I met a most curious young gentleman coming up on the train today: immensely tall, yet thin as a reed, with ebony hair and skin white as paper and the most arresting pair of emerald eyes it has ever been my luck to have seen. Despite his striking appearance, he seemed a beautifully-spoken and wonderfully-read youth, of great elegance both in his manner and his dress. We carried on a lively discourse in several languages, ancient and modern, for the entire journey, and indulged in much laughter together. Frankly, I can’t think that I’ve ever met a fellow I liked so well, on so short an acquaintance._

_We lighted, as the train rolled at last into Oxford, on the subject of stars (of all things), and I said to him, that no matter what the scientists tell us, or what I read in the papers, I cannot ever believe, entirely, that the stars are merely huge balls of flaming gasses. In my foolish mind, they will always seem far more magical._

_How do you imagine this remarkable gentleman responded, Tollers? He leant forward, taking my hand very gently into his (and his skin was nearly cold as ice, I ought to have said). "Even in your world, esteemed Mr. Lewis,” he informed me with great earnestness. “That is not what a star _is_ , but only what it is made of. You have always known this… have you not, Jack?”_

_Would you not call those words remarkable? It should be said, I had given him no name except my surname. I now find myself unable to shake the thought that I have met one of your wise and ancient elves of Middle Earth, or perhaps a pagan god of olden days, he struck me so, and I feel both sad, that our acquaintance proved so short, and yet elated, that such a being might actually exist in our workaday world, wearing excellent suits and riding our trains, making all the earth shine just a bit more by his presence._

_Charming as the fellow was, with nothing sinister about him, I am now determined to cease my dithering and borrow his singular appearance both as a model for Jadis, my White Witch, and for the rulers of lost Charn…_

Kurt had looked at him with raised brows, and Loki smiled back at him, saying, “Yes, I  remember, _hjarta minn_.”

Indeed, he recalled the conversation on the train (the rain-washed English countryside flying by the Second Class compartment windows, the milky Earl Grey tea shared from a flask, and the quirk of surprise to Mr. Lewis’s mouth when he detected that slight yet definite difference in flavour that informed him said milk was goat’s and not cow’s milk).

He recalled the man himself, who had soon cast off his slightly stuffy air of Oxford donnishness and revealed the eager, childlike heart within so completely that Loki had let down his own walls and spoken to him nearly as himself. It was not often he met an adult who longed for magic in the world, not for might or influence, but for the sense of wonder and possibility it might bring with it.

 

 _A star in a farm-bucket,_ Loki thought, as he nodded wearily to his friends and sank down upon the stoop, too exhausted to stand longer.

_What a perfect and prosaic thing to speed the end of an evil king. Mr. Lewis would have enjoyed the image. Would he perhaps have used it in one of his books?_

In the shadows of the stone shed, then, he glimpsed a tall and well-built woman in elaborate garb of solemn black. When her eyes caught his, and she smiled, Loki knew her at once.

His friend and once-companion, The Death of Kings.

Though a broad-brimmed hat shielded most of her face, the glow of moonlight upon the fair, fair  skin of her ungloved hands shone nearly as bright as the star through the darkness.

Ignaas and Mirjam raised the pail and the fire poured down, thick, pale and bright as the Milky Way on a cloudless night—alive, eager, hungry. Loki had expected Odin’s wrath to somehow manifest then, for his rage or wrath to pour forth along with the flame--or even, merely, the screams of his last agonies.

The night continued still, though, oh, so very still. Loki’s ears could detect only the soft _shush, shush_ of snow striking the cottage roof, or else joining the cushion of older falls that already covered the cobbles underfoot.

Ignaas returned to the house, while Mirjam took a seat on the steps by Loki’s side, the woodcutter coming out again with a great armload of coverlets that he carried to the shed, now emptied of the last shred or splinter of the Odin-tree's wood.

Mirjam rose then, and with a smile touched Loki’s shoulder. “In only a moment, Lord,” she said, and made her own way into the cottage, returning in a matter of moments with Loki’s own warm cloak, which she draped around his shoulders as he continued, in his weariness, to sit.

Mirjam’s eyes smiled into his. She reached to touch his cheek with her gloved fingers. “You are only a boy,” she said. “I mean no offence, my Lord Loki, but that makes me want to mother you. I am sorry to the depths of my heart to have hurt you.”

“You never hurt me,” Loki answered. “The only one who hurt me is he who always did so, and that old history has nothing to do with you, sweet lady.”

Mirjam said no more, only smiled again and pulled Loki to his feet. They joined Ignaas in the shed, burrowing together into the communal nest of coverlets he had made for them, as Mirjam poured hot mulled cider from a stoneware pitcher into stoneware cups.

They sipped, and were warm together, listening to the sharp teeth of the flame tear into stick after stick after stick.


	24. Once There Was a Way To Get Back Homeward

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As the reality of Odin's death sinks in, Loki bids farewell to Ignaas and Mirjam. The Avengers have a change in leadership, to the great amusement of the Winter Soldier. Loki takes flight for home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is from the song " _Golden Slumbers_ " by The Beatles. The verse continues, "Once there was a way to get back home/Sleep pretty darling do not cry/And I will sing a lullaby..." It seemed appropriate. 
> 
> _Mamma, Mamma, ó hjálpa mér Ég bið ykkur!_ ”="Mama, mama, I beg of you, help me!" 
> 
> "Stefan or Margali, Raven or Azazel"=Stefan Szardos (Kurt's repugnant foster brother and one of the trio of _Eastward in Ironwood_ baddies), Margali "Of the Winding Path" Szardos (Kurt's morally-questionable foster mother), Raven Darkholme (Kurt's shape-changer bio-mom, aka Mystique, uber-stylish supervillain), and Azazel (Kurt's murderous bio-dad, King of the Neyaphem, a race of ancient demons).
> 
> By "Great Book" Loki means the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous. By "coins of compliance" he means the tokens (such as First Meeting, 24 Hours, 30 Days, etc.) given to members by some chapters of the organization.
> 
> Mirjam's lullaby is an English translation of a Swedish traditional song, " _Ensam går jag här och vankar_ " (" _I Walk Alone and Wander Here_ ") from the website _Mama Lisa's World International Music & Culture_.
> 
> All Loki's lines of poetry are by ee cummings. "for whatever we lose..." is from _maggie and milly and molly and may_ (1956). "love is the voice..." is from _"i carry your heart with me_ " (1952). " _there's a hell of a good universe..._ " is from _"pity this busy monster, manunkind" (1944)._

* * *

Before dawn came, Ignaas slept, head pillowed upon Mirjam’s plump thigh, her fingers carding soothingly through his hair. Such tenderness there, such loyalty and love it made Loki’s heart nearly burst with homesickness. Three-score years could pass and these two, wife and husband, would still be so, as tender, as loving, still _hjarta hjarta hvers annars_ \--the heart of one another's heart.

Tony had been so kind since his return from New Zealand, wanting to set right again things that had been twisted awry between them, but most days Loki had felt too ill, weak and overwhelmed to even now be certain whether Tony fully understood how utterly angry he had been at first, forgiveness seeming impossible--and then how easy it had been, ultimately, to forgive.

His husband had given up his strong drink, abandoned his Ghost in the Wall, he read his Great Book and attended his meetings, the coins of compliance appearing one by one in the small copper bowl on the table beside the bed. Furthermore, Tony had opened up the portals of his mind to Loki's reading, and he had seen there no violence, no anger, disgust or deceit, only shame and adoration and the immense desire to try and try again.

They had been through a sad time, but when he returned--if he found within himself the strength and skill to return--that period of darkness and despair, Loki decided, would be done with. Tony was his love, this day and every day, and what should he have done, every token of sincerity and love having now returned? Hold an eternal grudge against his husband? Punish him?

It would not have been possible to punish Tony more than he punished himself, and Loki would not be so petty as to bring him further suffering. He had seen, in his own life, what hatred and disdain, an unforgiving heart and unending suspicion might bring, and he wanted none of it.

He only wished to return home to the bosom of his family, to joy, light and laughter, and there see an end to all ill-feeling. Despite the failing of his temporary body, he took those easier feelings as a sign of healing and health within his mind.

In time, he might even overcome his fears that to others he might seem too haughty, too foreign, too removed, too inhuman. He never wished to be any of those things.

When he thought, however, upon his recent relations with those of Midgard, Loki realized that he had detected little in their behavior that would mark him as an outcast in their midst. Rather, from the acts of many of his acquaintance, he might well believe that they valued him--not for wealth or station, but for reasons of honour or hard work, talent or kindness, even for a nobility that had nothing to do with high birth, but indeed for qualities of his character.

Loki held in his mind the images of those who cared for him, from Tony and the children, to Ignaas and Mirjam. He saw that his family loved him because he had, in fact, made himself worthy of being loved, that the woodcutter and his wife did not call him "my Lord" out of fear, or because it had been required of them, but out of genuine admiration.

He cherished these feelings, and knew they ought to buoy him up, like a ship upon the ocean, but at the same time he felt so weary. As always, his past reached out to him with skeletal hands, trying to drag him back into those times in which he had known only fury, fear and self-loathing.

A haze came over his eyes, and in that moment Loki found himself returned to the Asgard of the long past--in spirit if not in flesh, and stood at the foot of the long stair that led upward to _Hliðskjálf_ , his grandfather's Golden Throne.

“Loki, my son, come here to me…” The Allfather called down to him, his voice harsh, full of judgment, and also (how had he not seen the truth?) full of undeniable loathing. How had he failed to see this? Or, indeed, how those  words “my son” had so often caught him within a snare of hope, and then…

And then.

Loki tried to draw in a deep breath, but found he could not do so. He felt fragile, fragile as an egg. Like an egg in the process of cracking open, his innermost self increasingly revealed—yet no new life sprang forth from that broken shell, only an old, rotten, festering, entirely unhealed pain, a pain that would not be content with one or two silent tears, or even the silent screams that his hands held in, during those times he decorously withdrew to one of his secrets places in the tower.

This onslaught was more like vomiting than anything Loki understood as weeping—his entire body wracked, violently shaking, his head throbbing, stomach in knots, limbs useless, eyes and nose streaming to the point that he found himself blinded and choking.

The Allfather was dead, uprooted and burned to ashes, never to return again, never to torment him further, except in memory.

Odin was dead, yet Loki felt himself drowning, a vast tide of relief and fury and sorrow sweeping over him.

A woman’s voice spoke from a far, far distant place, and for some moments Loki was so lost to himself he mistook the voice for Frigga’s and found himself gasping out as best he could, “ _Mamma, Mamma, ó hjálpa mér Ég bið ykkur!”_

But, of course, the voice could not be the Allmother’s. For Loki, Frigga had been gone for close to an eternity. He had sent Kurse climbing through the palace to easily find her, and though his intent had never been that harm should come to his mother, he suspected his heart would carry a burden of guilt for her death that would last to the end of his days.

Even _had_ the voice been his grandmother’s (as Loki now knew her to have been), Frigga had never helped as Loki needed her to help him, any more than she had loved him (with the generous, protecting, nurturing and accepting love he required, that every child requires, most of all those younglings who are different from their playfellows), no matter how Loki might have pretended it was so.

Frigga’s love had been real, yes, but also distant and judging. She made much of “forgiving” him, much of her own forbearance. If she loved him at all, it was not because of who he _was_ , but despite of himself. Nothing of him, within or without, could be seen as truly lovely in her vision.

Suddenly, inside his head, Loki heard another voice, the voice of the one who loved him truthfully, faithfully and always, if any could be said to love him in all the Realms.

“I haven’t suffered as you have, Lo. I can’t pretend to know how that is, though I can understand very well what made you feel as you do. Perhaps…” (and here Kurt would smile, his golden eyes shining), “You even know a mysterious way to spool back time. I know it can be done--I’ve seen the results with my own eyes. Besides which, what can’t you do, _lieber Freund_ , if you set your mind to do it? But Loki, you are so loved, right here and right now. You have so many friends who care for you dearly, and I most of all. You have Tony, and if the two of you are at times like two little fawns struggling to find your ways out of weakness into strength, never doubt, _bitte_ , that you are the whole world to him, and find that strength you will. You have your beautiful children, as well, who love you us much as children have ever loved a parent.

“Never look to Odin and Frigga as the ones who were right and all-knowing. See the reality: they were foolish, selfish and blind. It’s what we have to do sometimes, use only our own good sense and try to see with only our own good eyes, not as we were taught to see by the ones who should have cared for us, but never did.

“You know what Logan would say? ‘Heh. Their loss.’ It’s a truth he taught me. Not to break my heart over Stefan or Margali, Raven or Azazel, as I might have done, searching always for what was wrong with me. Merely accept that they were blind or ignorant or had very silly priorities. We must both look at the wonderful families we’ve made for ourselves, who see all the good in us, as I see all the good in you, always, _mein liebster_ Loki.”

For a moment Loki felt himself held close in Kurt’s powerful arms, with Kurt’s warm, furry cheek pressed to his own cheek, with a sensation, inside and out, of being perfectly at peace, perfectly loved, perfectly home.

The next moment he crashed down again into the cold stone shed, in that Realm so much like the Midgard of the past.

Only the shed, Loki came to realize, was indeed not so very cold, for he lay against Ignaas’s shoulder, and the strong arms that held him were Ignaas’s arms. Mirjam embraced them both, there inside their snug nest of coverlets.

Beyond the door the fire had burned away entirely, leaving only little drifts of soft white ash, nearly indistinguishable from the snow, and every gust of the wind blew more of those drifts away, carrying them to the four points of the compass, until not a trace of the burning remained to remind them of what had been.

Likewise, Loki sent out his senses, pushing them to the utmost of their intensity, searching and searching everywhere, in this world and the next. He found nothing, neither clue nor sign of the cruel god he had once called "father."

Odin did not exist, not anymore.

The universe was free of him.

Loki was free of him. Nothing was more true than that simple truth.

This time he wept quietly, like a tired child who has been saved from some terrible fate and struggled home exhausted, comforted by his loving friends, safe within their arms.

In a little while, Loki slept, bereft of strength.

He woke to a beautiful bright day hushed with newly-fallen snow. A cheerful small fire burned in the doorway to warm them, and Mirjam watched over him, holding Loki’s hand in her warmly-gloved hands.

“Where is Ignaas?” Loki asked, sleep thickening his voice.

“Only indoors, setting things to rights,” Mirjam answered. “Soon we may go inside, my Lord.”

“I will never go inside again,” Loki answered. He felt no pain in the loss of this form, only a great, heavy weariness that called him back to dreaming. He knew he might have slept and slept, the worn-out body he occupied fading moment by moment, to become nothing, surely, before the sun rose again.

“I am sorry I to leave you, Mirjam,” Loki told her after a time.

“Dearheart,” Mirjam said, stroking Loki’s hair, kissing his cheek. “We will sit with you here, my husband and I, if that’s what you need in this time. Never fear you will be alone in your leaving.”

“Never alone,” Loki echoed. It had become a tremendous effort merely to think.

“The firelight falls on your face, My Lord,” Mirjam said quietly. “I see you weep. Tell me what grieves you?”

“It is nothing. Nothing.” Loki had not known he wept again. With great effort, he dried his face on a tattered sleeve, then turned his eyes to Mirjam’s, which were filled with the colours of the forest: brown, gold, green.

“I promised to Ignaas a boon,” he told her. “He wished for one thing alone that a god (who may not even be a god) might give you. By the light of this daybreak I ask you, Mirjam, do you wish for that which Ignaas wished for?”

Mirjam smiled again, though tears trembled in those lovely woodland eyes, and gave to Loki a brief nod. “Only that one thing, My Lord. Every other want, we possess in abundance.”

Loki questioned her with his eyes, even as his hand moved gently over her belly, aware of the softness beneath her thick, coarse winter clothing. Such an easy matter to slip his consciousness inside her, in a way somehow more intimate than intercourse, and yet entirely more chaste.

When it ended, that setting right of those few small things that needed setting right, Mirjam gave a small cry of joy and wonder. She knew at once. She knew, and her knowledge gave Loki great pleasure.

His hand fell away from her then, icy-cold and strengthless. No part of him would move save his eyes, and that only a little. He breathed shallowly, taking in the smallest sips of air.

In time, Ignaas returned, carrying a straw pallet, which he spread out over the stones, making a bed for Loki by that innocent fire, intended not to kill a god, only to warm their bodies. When he was fully settled, snugly wrapped, Mirjam sat on his left side, Ignaas on his right, each holding one of his hands. The spoke softly, to one another, to him, relaying tales of their childhoods, their courtship, their marriage, all the sweet stories of their world.

It struck Loki, as a tight, hot pain spread across his chest, that he had everything he had ever wanted, everything he had ever needed, only so, so, so far away from him now, as this final body failed. Fears that he would never again lay eyes upon Tony, or Kurt, or the children again overtook him.

If he pleaded with Queen Hela, might she allow his spirit to fly out to them on those nights it was said the dead walk the daylight Realms? Could his own small, belovéd Blessed Death come to him in the Underworld?

Loki knew the answers to none of these questions. He felt only foolish, young and frightened. He struggled against the soft, heavy mantle of sleep as Mirjam, in her sweet, low voice, began to sing to him:

_I walk alone and wander here,_  
_Looking for my friend._  
_I walk alone and wander here,_  
_Looking for my friend._  
_Look, I meet him here,_  
_He, who my heart holds so dear._  
_Say if you will dance with me,_  
_As you did before this?_

Between one moment and the next, Loki slipped away, darkness washing over him completely.

* * *

“So, Cap,” Tony said, “We figured that if Mohammad wouldn’t come to the mountain, the mountain would have to come see what was keeping Mo’s ass glued to a chair outside the Hulk Tank.”

“Language!” Clint chirped. “What? I figured I’d help out, since Steve-o has opted out of performing his usual duties.”

“Mohammad…?” Steve felt as if he’d entered in two-thirds of the way through a conversation. Maybe a conversation in the English of Shakespeare, or that snippet of Chaucer's _The Canterbury Tales_ his old teacher, Mr. O’Donnell, had read out loud in sophomore English, right before Steve caught pneumonia and was out of school for the better part of Winter Quarter, “Whan that Aprille with his shoures soote…”

He’d be willing to bet Loki could say that entire opening right off the top of his head, and understand every word. Steve had a respect for knowledge and learning, he really did. He knew he wasn’t a stupid man. He liked to read and try to improve his mind, but sometimes he wondered if people he knew, like Bruce and Tony with all their degrees, thought less of him for his lack of education. Sometimes he thought less of himself, that the thing he knew best was fighting.

Where was Loki, anyway? Steve hadn’t seen him for days, not since Natasha came to tell him about the fire and the problem with Thor, and he’d declined to go with her. Come to think of it, he hadn’t seen anybody since then, only a nice (but sad-looking) older lady who brought regular meals for him and Bucky, and sometimes clean clothes for them both, too.

He hadn’t exactly seen his dear friend during that time either. Bucky—the one he thought of as _his_ Bucky, the one he loved so dearly--hadn’t put in an appearance for all those days. From their body language, Steve could tell his teammates were less than pleased with him. Was Loki also angry? Loki usually seemed so pleasant-natured these days, but what if they’d really needed his help with Thor, and Steve had let them down?

Actually, where was Thor? He wasn’t here with the rest of the team…

“At least it looks like Mrs. Ransome’s cooking is keeping you two lovebirds healthy.” Tony’s voice held a tired bitterness above and beyond its normal sarcastic tone. He looked awful—pale, and skinnier than usual, with circles under his eyes so dark they looked like shiners.

“It’s not like that…” Steve began. They all stared at him.

“Aaaand… take it away, loverman!” Clint said.

“Please, Clint, not on the job?” Phil answered mildly, the way Phil always answered.

Steve hadn’t even realized he was there. Phil had a funny way of fading into the woodwork until he wanted to be seen, as if he possessed some kind of protective coloration, like a chameleon.

What had happened, anyway, that Phil was even there? It couldn’t be time for the quarterly meeting already…

“Is…” Steve began. The others looked at him with a distinct lack of friendliness. “Is Thor... doing better?”

“Peachy,” Tony said.

“Hey, here’s an idea,” Clint said, “How’s about we take this to the conference room. BuckyBritches there is giving me the heebie-jeebies. Those are some major stink-eye skills your buddy has going there, Cap. Did they mix that little talent into the Winter Soldier Kool-Aid?”

Behind the glass-that-wasn’t-really-glass, Bucky laughed nastily. Even to Steve, it sounded like the voice of pure evil.

“Tony, couldn’t Loki…”

Tony cut him off. “No, actually Cap, Loki couldn’t.” His voice was flat now, dead-sounding. “Let’s move. And you are coming with us, Steve. No arguments. Logan and Mrs. R. are giving the kids breakfast, but I need to see them off to school. We call that ‘living up to your responsibilities,’ Captain. You should try it.”

Bruce glanced at his watch. “Speaking of, I should spell Kurt pretty soon. He’s been on duty over sixteen hours now, and last time I peeked in, his tail was literally dragging on the floor.”

“Christ, what happened to Hank?” Tony asked.

“Got called back to Salem Center,” Bruce answered. “I don’t know the particulars, but I gather the X-Men had a mission go sideways. Hank said he’d be back as soon as he could, though.”

“Well,” Tony said, and the tired bitterness he squeezed into that one word beat anything Steve had ever heard. “It’s not as if there’s anything he could actually do.”

“Tone…” Bruce began in what was surely meant as a soothing voice.

“You know what? Fuck this. Fuck the conference room. Thing is, Steve, we all voted. You’re out as team leader. Natasha’s in. Consider the star ceremonially ripped off the chest of your spangle suit—which, by the way doesn’t even look like the U.S, flag, it looks like the flag of Puerto Rico. Excellent history of getting things right there, buddy. And so I bid you all adieu. I’m gonna go take care of my family. See ya.”

If the heavy, double-locking antechamber door had been able to slam, Tony almost certainly would have slammed it. He certainly left a slamming impression.

“Um, me too, I guess,” Bruce said, though he left far more quietly.

“Uh. Yeah.” Clint threw one arm around Phil’s shoulders, the other around Natasha’s. The trio left without saying another word.

Steve sank down in his chair. He felt sick, devastated, confused, but didn’t understand the meaning behind any of it.

In his transparent prison, Bucky—no, not Bucky, the _Winter Soldier_ —smirked, shuffled his feet, finally gave a single dark, unpleasant laugh.

“Christ, you always were dim, Steve,” he said, his voice like a cruel parody of Bucky’s voice. “All that, and you still don’t get it, do you? Your magician’s dying, buddy. He’s not coming back again. And if he’s not coming back, guess who else isn’t?”

He strutted over to his own chair and sat, knees a mile apart, arms, both real and metallic, folded across his chest.

Beneath the cockiness Steve noticed something else: the cruel, stubbled face appeared terribly pale, with hollows at the temples and under the cheekbones, and dark circles to rival Tony’s.

Bucky was in there, he knew it. Fighting. Suffering. Losing.

“Bucky,” Steve whispered.

“Nope. Not ever, ever, ever again.”

The Winter Soldier leaned toward the glass, grinning from ear-to-ear.

* * *

Oh, weary…

_Ignaas, Mirjam, the thanks of my whole of my heart I give you, with whatever blessings may be mine to impart. You deserve all worthy things, my dear ones._

_Know joy in one another. Know joy._

So very weary, there in the dark…

Limbs numb and heavy, eyes sightless, ears unable to hear.

No more loving hold of hands upon his hands, not, at least, that Loki could feel.

Drifting…

Drifting helplessly out to sea…

_… thy sea is so great and my boat is so small…_

That was a prayer, was it not? Most likely to the man-god, but lovely for all that.

Yes, a prayer. A prayer for those who fished upon the oceans, from the Land of the Bretons--or so Kurt had told him.

Dear Kurt, so far from him…

“ _for whatever we lose(like a you or a me)  
its always ourselves we find in the sea_ ”

Loki found himself smiling. Perhaps only a little, and perhaps not with his final, failed body, but smiling.

Mirjam yet sang. The soft notes of the melody rippled through him.

He remembered other words written by the poet who spoke of "finding one’s self in the sea," the poet Tony (wonder of wonders!) quoted at their wedding, who understood love so beautifully…

“ _love is the voice under all silences, the hope which has no opposite in fear; the strength so strong mere force is feebleness: the truth more first than sun, more last than star..._ “

“ _more last than star…_ ”

Odin had burned in starfire, by his doing, and Loki could at last, at long, long last, go home again.

He could go home…

He would call upon the "strength so strong," and it would fuel his flight. Even as he slipped free and away, unfettered now by flesh, impermanent and dim as a candle flame without a body to hold him, he knew…

Knew he would complete his journey. He loved too much to lose himself alone in the darkness.

The hope without fear compelled him. Yes, he would find his way. He would.

_“listen:_ ” the poet also wrote, _“there's a hell of a good universe next door; let's go”_

“Let’s go,” Loki told himself, “Let’s go!”

Mirjam’s sweet melody still humming through his spirit, Loki flew, searching through the dark for the bright beacon of himself he had once left behind him, to follow homeward in just such a time as this.


	25. Waking the Not-Yet-Dead

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Tony abandons all hope.
> 
> Rated "F" for feels. Be warned, this is a very sad chapter, though with a ray of hope at the end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Paul Klee (1879 – 1940) was a quirky Swiss-German painter whose work was influenced by the expressionist, cubist, and surrealist movements. The "small painting" in question would most likely be worth at least $300,000.00.
> 
>  _The Jetsons_ was a "futuristic" Hanna-Barbera animated sitcom originally shown in the U.S. in the early 60's then, later, in syndication.
> 
> Tony is misquoting Dorothy at the end of the film _The Wizard of Oz_. As Dorothy prepares to return to Kansas, she tells the Scarecrow, "I think I'll miss you most of all."
> 
>  _unsere lieben_ Loki=our dear Loki (German)
> 
> A push-button light switch has two buttons, one above the other. Pushing the button that's out opens or closes the contacts and pops out the button that was in, so next time the process is reversed. When I was a kid, they could still be seen in some older homes, so Steve, born a considerable time earlier, would probably be quite familiar with them.
> 
> "Private E-1" is the lowest rank in the U.S. Army, reserved for raw recruits, incarcerated soldiers and those being punished by being stripped of all rank. They don't even have insignia.

* * *

Tony always found himself irritated by the infirmary. He had a whole fucking tower at his disposal, why had he allowed the place to be built so damn small? Denial that anyone would ever require its facilities?

Walls had needed to be knocked down in the lab, operating theater, and what was now unofficially known as “Loki’s Room” just to give Hank McCoy sufficient room to move around, and even so, standing here at the foot of his husband’s bed with Bruce on one side, Kurt on the other, a worn-out Thor snoring softly in his chair in the corner, the place felt so cramped Tony could hardly breathe.

Or maybe that had less to do with available floor space than it did with the Loki in the bed looking less like the guy he’d married, more alien and incredibly, unbelievably fragile, like some kind of fantastical elf/dragonfly hybrid.

Tony ran his fingertips gently over the marble perfection of Loki’s bare foot. The skin felt searingly hot. Bruce had mumbled something about “opportunistic infections,” he remembered.

That was some time after the stuff he’d whispered about “…meeting Loki’s nutritional needs,” but only a little after, “The feeding tube’s been a total failure and we can’t find a way, intravenously, of…”

“You sure you’re up for this, Tone?” Bruce asked quietly. “I can stay. Both of us can stay, if you need us.”

Tony shook his head. “There’s Thor for backup. You guys grab some sleep.” Jesus, he sounded like Lurch, the Addams Family butler. Higher-pitched, maybe, but equally lively.

Both his best friend and Loki’s best friend gave him looks before they went back to work, which in this case was repositioning Loki so he wouldn’t develop fucking _bedsores_. Which was just too horrifying to contemplate.

Tony could tell both Bruce and Kurt had been doing this too long by the way they didn’t even need to speak to communicate, they just silently and efficiently moved Loki into his new position. Kurt (since he was so much the stronger of the two when Bruce wasn’t actually Hulking) did most of the actual turning and lifting. Bruce tucked in supportive pillows like a pro.

“So,” Tony began, needing to ask a question he couldn’t actually stand to have pass his lips. “What do you guys…?”

That was it, the most of the unaskable he could force out of his mouth.

“Oh, Tony…” Bruce stopped what he was doing, which happened to be gently sliding rolled-up washcloths into Loki’s hands, permanently contracted now into fists. The washcloths stopped his fingernails from cutting into his palms (Bruce had told him) as he lay there, just lay there, in his soulless, unmoving state of whatever-this-was.

Not living, certainly. Tony didn’t exactly need advanced medical training to be able to interpret the totally flat lines on the brainwave monitors.

 _What am I doing?_ he asked himself. _What am I fucking doing?_

Going on Hela’s assurances that her _Pabbi_ would return, that’s what. Trying to give Baby Edwin sufficient time to… To do what? Starve his _Pabbi_ to death?

Tony had no illusions. The reason Loki looked like this, the reason they couldn’t “meet his nutritional needs” was that their kid was feeding off him like a vampire—by the time Edwin got his, there wasn’t a damn thing left over for his poor _Pabbi_ to live on.

Only that wasn’t fair. It wasn’t the baby’s fault, it was just the crazy truth of his husband’s biology, and Tony knew Loki wouldn’t have had it any other way, not with the no-limits love he had for their children.

“Tony, god, I mean, there’s no need to… uh… yet…” Bruce verbally fumbled, dragging off his glasses to polish them on the hem of his less-than-pristine beige polo shirt.

“ _Nein_!” Kurt spat out—and a Kurt suddenly, uncontrollably furious was, Tony had to admit, a pretty damn terrifying sight.

For one thing, his yellow eyes literally flashed. Like headlights. His tail also gave a vicious whip-crack and knocked a painting off the wall (a small Klee, but a nice one, or so Pepper said--Tony just knew it had a bunch of teeny fish and the colors were pretty), sending it flying at practically escape velocity. Glass sprayed everywhere, and even though Bruce flung himself across Loki to protect him, he was instantly bleeding heavily from a dozen small wounds.

Kurt whirled and fled, and Tony, after mouthing, “ _Text Logan!_ ” over his shoulder, raced after, thanking whatever powers watched over distraught mutants that Kurt hadn’t chosen to bamf away. Tony even managed to catch up to his German friend in the corridor before he could make good on his escape.

“Kurt! C’mon, Kurt.”

The young mutant stopped, his back in a straight, stiff line, his tail once more sprawled along the linoleum with the limpness of utter despair.

Tony approached cautiously. Kurt under normal circumstances was the kindest, gentlest man he’d ever met, or ever would meet, he suspected.

Kurt in the middle of a total freak-out…?

Yeah, that just might be something else entirely. Tony already knew his friend was a lethal fighter, what if it was his turn to lose it, the same way Thor had not so long before?

He should have known better. Kurt in turmoil was still Kurt. He let Tony guide him over to the floor-to-ceiling windows and sit him down on a butt-ugly and not-exactly-comfortable sofa. Who chose these things? Had he chosen these things?

It hit Tony that, since Loki, he found himself gravitating more towards things that were useful, sure, but also elegant and timeless. This sofa was none of the above. It was, frankly, a piece of shit. It looked like something from The Jetsons, only in black vinyl.

“Loki could probably rag on this damn couch for fifteen minutes if you let him get started.” Tony slumped beside his friend. “It would be epic. Shakespearean, even!”

“If he doesn’t come back, Tony…” Kurt swiped at his eyes with one softly-fuzzy hand.

Tony hadn’t even known he was crying, that dark fur of his just soaked up the tears.

“You kidding me? Loki? He’s coming back. You know how stubborn he is. He’s gonna toast Odin’s evil-ass crumpets and then hurry on home. To us.”

Tony generally wasn’t a guy for holding other guy’s hands (Loki’s excepted), but he found himself reaching out for Kurt’s, realizing, in that moment, that he loved this strange-looking young man from a country on the other side of the world, who’d given Loki so much kindness and support. Hell, who’d even saved their children (according to the boys) from being roasted alive.

If there was anyone on earth he owed, and owed big-time, that person was Kurt Wagner.

He hated seeing Kurt-the-eternally-positive so distressed, so used-up, both because Kurt really had become the furry blue German younger brother he’d never had, and seeing Kurt sad was nearly the saddest thing ever.

Also because, if Kurt had given up hope, that truly meant there wasn’t any hope left in the world.

“You’re a good guy, Kurt,” Tony told him. “You’ve done so much. You have to be exhausted.”

“I would have done a thousand times more,” Kurt said simply. “A thousand times, Tony. I need…I want…” He glanced at Tony, then swiftly away. “Before… After I returned…”

Tony could practically hear the gears turning as Kurt, who truly spoke English beautifully, sorted through his words to express something almost too complex to be expressed in any tongue, especially one that wasn’t necessarily the same language he thought in.

“When I came back…” Kurt tried again. “After I... I did everything I was meant to do, loved every person I was meant to love. I was me, and yet…”

Kurt’s other hand moved over Tony’s hand, holding it warmly between his two oddly-textured palms. Tony had always found something weirdly irresistible about that texture, which was slightly ticklish, slightly clingy, and somehow—Tony still hadn’t been able to work the exact mechanics of that how—enabled Kurt to either stick to or move easily, at the speed of his choice (sometimes very, very fast indeed), over any surface: rough, smooth, wet, dry, didn’t matter, Kurt could handle it.

“You don’t believe in souls,” Kurt said. Being Kurt, of course there was no judgement whatsoever in the statement.

Tony almost managed a smile. “Let’s say I’m a little more open to the possibility than I used to be.”

Kurt let out a soft breath of laughter. “Perhaps we all are, _ja_?”

“ _Ja_ ,” Tony echoed, then laughed a little too, at himself. “That is to say, ‘yeah.’ Or even ‘yes’.”

“I felt the absence of my soul,” Kurt went on. “I missed it. It felt harder to find my moral compass. I had to think very hard to be sure my actions were right actions. I began to be afraid, often, that merely thinking was not enough.” His bright fangy smile appeared suddenly, though at the same his eyes grew brighter and paler, and Tony suddenly knew exactly what it looked like when Kurt cried. “And then, a miracle! Who knew that a soul could grow back again?”

“Or grow from nothing, where there never had been one,” Tony said.

He withdrew his hand from Kurt’s hold, but only to wrap both arms around the younger man, holding him tightly. “The first thing I’m gonna tell you is what I told Hela. It may be hard as fuck, and hurt like fuck, but we’re gonna make it. That means all of us. The second thing is, whatever happens--and, believe me, I know this sounds hokey, but chalk it up to the category of hokey-but-sincere, maybe?--we’re still goddamn family. So Logan’s continues on as my scary-as-hell older brother. Point Break’s my big-hearted, slightly dim, immortal Nordic god brother. And you’re stuck with the position of that impossibly good little brother my parents selfishly never thought to give me. I love the hell out of all of you, but I think I love you most of all, Scarecrow. And yes, I know I misquoted.”

“Perhaps if you do misquote blatantly enough, _unsere lieben_ Loki will arise in outrage from his coma merely to lecture you?” Kurt's smile was tremble-y, but there.

“Yeah, I’m thinking of heavily misquoting Shakespeare over the next day or so. That’ll work, if anything does.”

“Or quote correctly, but use the quotes out of context.” Kurt gave a small, pained laugh. “Oh, he is so special to me, Tony, that I can’t think how I existed in the days before. I no longer know how to ‘make it,’ as you say, without Lo here. I can say, it hurt rather less to materialize around a villain's fist, and die, and I don't mean that as hyperbole.”

“Yeah,” Tony said. “You know what? I don’t either, exactly. Know how to make it, I mean--though I guess we will.”

What more could be said? Both empty of hope, they held onto one another with bruising tightness and cried like the world’s saddest babies

At six o’clock, long after Kurt had withdrawn for some much-needed sleep and Tony had returned to the infirmary, Jane came downstairs. She seemed to be wearing good-quality maternity yoga attire, but what originally appeared to Tony to be yoga pants were quickly proven, instead, to be the world’s most effective pair of bossy pants.

She leveled a pointing finger as deadly in intent as any sniper’s rifle, first at her fiancé, then at Tony. “You. And you. Upstairs. Now. Mrs. Ransome made a nice dinner. There are children who need you. Up. Go.”

Thor blinked at her. “Most-belovéd Jane…”

The deadly finger went up at an angle, clearly indicating, “Don’t you even think of starting with me, you ancient, immortal god, you!”

Thor clearly knew to surrender without engaging in hostilities, though he did try a plaintive, “My dearest brother will…”

Jane’s eyes narrowed. “Erik’s going to sit with him. You two are going to eat a decent hot meal with your family, spend quality time with the children, then go to sleep in your own beds.”

Jane may have looked like a sweet, harmless, little pregnant brainiac, but she was clearly not above playing dirty. “What would Loki want you to do?”

Thor’s jaw dropped and his eyes went almost comically round and wide. He looked like a huge, distraught Manga character.

Jane took his hand. “Erik will sit with Loki,” she said, firmly but kindly.

The elderly scientist sidled quickly through the doorway as the three of them came out, not meeting any of their eyes. Clearly Jane had bullied him into cooperation as well.

“The slightest beep!” Tony called back into the room as Jane hustled Thor and him down the corridor, elevator-bound. “The slightest twitch!”

A faint, “ _Ja_!” drifted back to him.

In retrospect, Jane had been perfectly correct. Thor was pretty much on the verge of something, and whatever it was wasn’t good. Tony had felt both full of despair and massively sick ever since his mega-cryfest with Kurt (who was currently sleeping the sleep of the just and enormously sleep-deprived in his usual tower bed, Logan reported).

The presence of the kids and some, good unpretentious comfort food helped settle him. Tony didn’t eat much, but he ate.

Mrs. Ransome stayed, and Bruce joined them for dinner. The meal was quiet, but not depressing.

Someone (clearly Jöri) had taught Sleip to do a walrus impression that included sticking green beans up his nose, and a distracted Hela sculpted quite a credible miniature of the tower out of mashed potatoes. Tony didn’t say much to either (though he did gently remove the beans).

Whatever got them through, he figured.

After dinner and cleanup, Hela refused apple pie and went to Loki’s piano in the alcove, playing softly to herself. Her complicated favorites, yes, but some simpler things too. Once he heard her singing, her clear voice quiet but carrying:

 _Once there was a way to get back homeward_  
_Once there was a way to get back home_  
_Sleep pretty darling do not cry_  
_And I will sing a lullaby_  
_Golden slumbers fill your eyes_  
_Smiles await you when you rise_  
_Sleep pretty darling do not cry_  
_And I will sing a lullaby…_

“Honey,” Tony called, “That’s really pretty, but you need to come join us now.”

To his surprise, Hela didn’t give him any back-talk, just came and climbed up in his lap, burying her little face against his chest. Tony rocked her and stroked her beautiful long curls, as Jöri slid in on one side of him, Sleip on the other, Fen on Sleipnir's lap, the five of them pressed together tight as tight could be.

They’d left the front door unlocked, and slowly people gathered: Jorge and Anita first (Loki’s Boys’ and Girls’ club supervisor and his wife, who was Loki’s literary agent), then Nat and Pepper, Clint and Phil, Logan, Thea Ransome’s husband Frances, the Rosenblums junior and senior and their wives, who ran the deli downstairs and were Loki's good friends, Hank and Ororo and Kitty, Loki’s closest X-Buddies.

Almost the last to arrive, a small group fresh from London: little bird-like Martha Hudson, followed by Mary Watson, then her harassed-looking husband, John, with Sherlock Holmes in tow.

Sherlock looked petulant and appeared to have a thick storm-cloud hovering over his head—though he also had on a big dark topcoat even more splendid than the last one Tony had seen him wearing.

He stalked up to Tony in a magnificent flair of coat-skirts, something like the swirl of a villain's cloak, and spat, “You were meant to mind him! What use are you if you couldn’t mind him?”

Tony met his stepson's eyes. What answer could he possibly give to that?

“None,” he said finally, flatly. What else could he say? He hadn’t been any good for Loki, in the long run. He’d hurt him over and over, and now…

“None,” he repeated, and just like that, he couldn’t take it, this wake-that-wasn’t-a-wake because his beautiful, wonderful Loki, the one and only god he’d ever believe in, wasn’t dead, but how could any hope survive when absolutely everyone they knew had abandoned it completely?

He dropped Hela onto a random lap in passing, and fled.

Tony kicked off his shoes and removed his belt, but otherwise fell spread-eagled on top of the covers fully clothed.

First he indulged in ginormous crying jag number two until his pillow was soggy, flipped it over, then cried a little more.

Between sobs, he could hear people going, and Pepper, ever the organizer, making sleeping arrangements for those who didn’t want to leave the tower. Then, in the boys’ room next door, an explanation of the bunk-bed game followed by a discussion of whether there was room for a fourth level, because it was only fair that Sherlock have a bed there too—he was a Lokison brother, after all.

They were so sweet, his boys. So thoughtful. Even so, Tony wondered if he could have entered into all this if he’d known in advance about the pain.

Yeah, Tony knew from pain, as they sometimes said in this neck of the woods. He knew from hurt, physical and emotional, but this… This was unreal. This was unbearable. He couldn’t bear it.

He just couldn’t.

Someone cracked open the door--without knocking, so of course it was Sherlock. “Your children… my brothers… are sleeping. They require a remarkable amount of ritual in order to settle, but are strangely untiresome on the whole. This may require further study.” He started to close the door, then opened it again. “Oh, and John told me I ought to apologize. He said I ought not to have spoken to you as I did. John is generally right about these things.”

“Don’t worry about it, Sherlock,” Tony muttered into the only-semi-soggy side of his pillow.

Sherlock began a second retreat, then stopped again. “They’re actually not boring, compared to Mycroft, you know. The two little ones and the bigger one. I might consent to spend more time in their company.”

“Your bros would like that,” Tony mumbled. “G’night, Sherlock.”

“Good night,” the younger man answered formally, adding after a few seconds, in an almost human tone, “Sleep well, Tony.”

Tony never heard the door shut. He’d fallen asleep. He woke some indeterminate time later to total darkness, and called out muzzily, “J.A.R.V.I.S., lights!” before he remembered.

“Um…” said a voice from the dark.

“Um, indeed," Tony answered. "Just as a point of interest, why are you sitting in my bedroom with the lights out, Steve?”

“Getting up my nerve.” Steve gave an uncomfortable little laugh.

“For what exactly? Also, make yourself useful and turn on the lights? Low please—they’re on a dimmer. The round knob on the wall where you’re probably searching for a switch. Or those button thingies from the days of the dinosaurs.”

Wonder of wonders, Steve got it right on the first go.

Tony sat up. He felt rumpled, tear-stained, sweaty and gross.

Steve looked crisp and pressed in a blue suit, white dress shirt and a subdued navy-and-gray striped tie. It certainly was a change from the spangle-suit.

“Testifying before Congress?” Tony asked. “Or did someone die?”

He realized what he’d said two seconds later. “Oh, hell, Steve…”

“Language,” Steve whispered. His face was turned away, but even in the low light, Tony could see the moisture standing in his eyes. “I have to ask, Tony. Is this something I could have prevented? If I’d gone when Natasha called me?”

Tony spent a couple more seconds wanting to be cruel, then shook it off. “No, Cap,” he answered wearily. “While I’ll maintain that you let the team down in a major way, have had your head thoroughly inserted up your ass for weeks, and totally deserve to be demoted to Private E-1 America, what happened—what is happening--to Loki isn’t on you or any of us. It’s one hundred percent on Thor and Loki’s bastard of a dad.”

“Is… Is this likely to be a problem for Earth?”

“With any luck, Odin’s dead now,” Tony said in a flat voice. “At least, I hope so.” He waited for Steve to be shocked, and adopt his righteous expression.

Instead, Steve just nodded. “Good. I hope so too.” His mouth did a funny, twisty thing. “I got a version. In Germany. How should I say it? ‘Heavily edited but essentially true?’ I hope the old ratfink got what was coming to him.”

 _Ratfink?_ Tony wanted to say, _Seriously, Cap?_ But he bit his tongue, except to answer, “Yeah, me too.”

“Mr. Wagner—Kurt—took me to his church tonight. For the late mass. We lit candles, after. I know you’re not a believer, but I hope you don’t mind. I didn’t know what else…”

Normally, Tony might have a couple things to say about that, both of them snarky, but found he didn’t really want to say them at the moment.

 _Loki cares—cared—about Steve a lot,_ he reminded himself. _He thinks the world of him._

“Loki tends to have kind of a unique perspective on 'Midgardian beliefs', as he’d say, but I know he would like that," Tony said, "Kurt showed him the candles at St. B's when he fixed the organ. Loki found then—and I quote here—‘profound and touching.’ So, thank you, Steve.”

“Um… You’re welcome, Tony. If there’s anything…” Steve climbed to his feet, looking huge, manly and awkward.

“I was such a fool," Cap went on. "I know that now. To hold all that Chitauri nonsense against Loki, when he was put in such an awful position, nowhere to turn… And I knew him. I knew him so well, once. I should have recognized him when I saw him in Germany three years ago, and done something to help. When he came to live here, I should have been his friend from the beginning. My good Lord, I knew him so well! He never lied to me, except maybe a little bit about context, because how much could I have believed back then? I liked him so much. I loved him, more than anybody I ever knew, except for Bucky, maybe. And my mom. I really loved him, and I…” Steve’s Adam’s apple bobbed once, then again. “I can’t. I can’t, Tony.”

And with that, fearless Captain America, who never ran from anything, fled, shutting the door quietly behind him—because even in panicked flight he was considerate.

After a minute, Tony sighed and got to his feet.

One by one, he checked on the kids, first Hela in her decidedly un-Helalike temporary room, then the Three Musketeers in their triple bunk bed.

Hela’s eyes opened a crack after Tony kissed her forehead. “Bess hasn’t come yet,” she murmured drowsily. “The Death of Kings. She hasn’t joined us here.” A second later she sank deeply back into sleep.

All three boys had made a puppy-pile in Fen’s cavelike bottom bunk. They didn’t stir when Tony stripped the quilt off Sleip’s bed to cover them all.

“Love you, guys,” Tony whispered, feeling like the only waking person on earth.

He returned to his own room, contemplated a shower, but decided it was just too much work at the moment. He settled for stripping off his disgusting clothes, leaving them lying on the floor.

Wearing only his boxers, he slid under the covers. They felt cold and vacant, more like the covers of some nameless chain motel in some distant town than the sheets and blankets of his own, welcoming bed.

He thought he’d lie awake for hours, but instead he fell back instantly asleep, and there, he dreamed of Loki’s voice.

“Husband, scooch over,” said the Loki in his dreams. “I am quite frozen, and inordinately weary. And besides that, _hjarta hjarta minn_ , I would like this night to lie with you after being so long away.”

It was so perfect, so perfectly, quirkily, wonderfully Loki, Tony wanted to weep again, but there wasn’t a tear left anywhere. He was completely drained.


	26. Golden Slumbers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At long last, Loki finds his way home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mirjam's song and Erik's are the same, only in two different languages.
> 
> Let's Speak Swedish! (Låt Oss Tala Svenska!), with Dr. Erik Selvig:  
>  _Välkommen hem,_ Loki="welcome home, Loki  
>  _Åh, min kära dumt gud spel_ ="oh, my foolish god of mischief"  
>  _söt kille_ =sweet boy  
>  _Vad fan, käre prins_ =what the hell, dear prince  
>  _Åh, kanske_ =oh, maybe
> 
>  _Sharknado_ is a 2013 TV movie in which a freak waterspout leaves the streets of Los Angeles flooded and infested with sharks. Don't you hate it when that happens?

* * *

Loki chose the thread of Mirjam’s melody as a compass point to steer by. In all that darkness, without sight or sensation, what else might he find to chart his course? Only the song at the beginning and the faint, guttering green light of self calling to self at the end.

Except…

Confusion nearly overwhelmed him. The song came from ahead of him as well as behind. It should not have led him home, only on a backward spiral to the cottage by the eaves of the wood, yet there it was, surrounding the green, that slice of self divided out from the whole of his being—oh, so long ago now!—for just such an extremity as this.

Loki felt sorry for the good old man. He knew now it hurt poor Erik to keep even a fragment of a god (if he was a god, Loki still regarded the subject as open to debate) in his head—but he _had_ asked for the boon, not merely had his way. They did discuss the potential for difficulties, though he rather suspected Erik no longer remembered the conversation.

Loki followed, still confused and, though he tried not to be, fearful. He was not, naturally, afraid of the dark… oh, but this darkness, this darkness, it threatened to overwhelm him, to swallow him entire. He could not be lost, not like this in the belly of the abyss again. By all the gods, please not again.

Pure panic surged in him, and fear—that this was something Thanos engineered. That this was his punishment, his consequence, and the cruel Titan waited, laughing at his bewilderment, just beyond the horizon of that which he could detect.

But then it struck him. The song, the thread of melody was the same, but there were two voices, two singers. Behind him lay Mirjam’s sweet, true-pitched contralto. Ahead of him lay a voice that rumbled and wavered, keeping only a distant, hand-shaking acquaintance with the actual tune.

The words, too, were different. Neither Mirjam’s words, nor Mirjam’s tongue, but a language Loki knew well, regardless.

Swedish. The words were Swedish, the voice that of an old man not overly used to singing.

“ _Ensam går jag här och vankar_ ,” the elder sang.

 _Söker efter vännen min_  
_Ensam går jag här och vankar,_  
_Söker efter vännen min_  
_Se, jag möter honom här,_  
_Han, som är min hjärtans kär_  
_Vill du såsom förr med mej_  
_Svänga om I dansen säj?_

Loki knew him. The man who sang. Of course he did. Knew him far better, in fact, then the greater part of the mortals within his orbit, except for those few closest to him, even though, just now, pure spirit and bodiless, he could sense, and hear, but not see.

His Erik. His poor, dear Erik. His much-loved Dr. Erik Selvig, who Loki had been forced to use so cruelly, not merely once, but again, first in the building of the terrible machine that opened portals between worlds, again when he left the piece of his soul for safekeeping, not fully understanding that even such a narrow slice would drive the old man to the brink of madness.

“There’s a god in my head!” Erik had cried, in such pain.

Loki would not have done the same again. He had injured Erik and caused him shame, though he had never meant to do so. His thoughts at the time had been focused on quickness and cleverness.

Today he would surely show more kindness, more consideration.

 _Poor Erik_ , he thought, _I have wronged you deeply, however willing you were, then, to help me. I have done you dire harm._

Loki reached out to that long-abandoned slice of self, called it home, and in doing so found himself rushing back into the world he knew, to Midgard his home, toward his own true body.

His consciousness brushed against it once, and again, and it was as if he touched something exquisite, something of perfect softness, warmth, texture, that must be touched, explored, again and again—and then suddenly he seemed to fall the longest of long ways, down, down into deepest darkness, then soaring up again into perfect light, the missing piece that had dwelt within Erik swooping in, an answer to his call, to join with him as one, settling into his own head, spreading out to his limbs, and then to every part of him, first tingling, then warming, filling every delicious inch of his body.

Loki shuddered all over, feeling the stiffness and weakness of limbs too long immobile—but oh, to feel once more the delightful heat and weight of flesh after such a long, cold, weightless time in the darkness! Oh, to breathe, even if his lungs felt sore, the breathing strange.

Yet better than any other sensation, better than coming home to his own flesh (after occupying seven far-too-mortal avatar bodies, one after another after another, each new form in constant decay), was the warm small presence of his son within him, his unformed mind reaching to touch Loki’s and be comforted at once by Loki’s love for him.

For a long while Loki merely kept himself still, holding tiny Edwin in his thoughts, assuring him that _Pabbi_ was there, _Pabbi_ was there, Edwin need have no worries now, _Pabbi_ was home, and loved him.

Only when Edwin slept did Loki become aware of other things—worst of all, that a horrible hard tube stretched down his throat and, nearly as bad, that someone had taped his eyelids shut.

Loki’s arms bristled with wires and tubes. He fought hard not to struggle and choke upon the thick unbending tube inside him, impeding his breath.

“ _Välkommen hem,_ Loki,” Erik said softly. His voice was hoarse and he sounded scarcely awake. “You’ve been gone a long while. Would you like to have that tube taken out?”

Loki nodded as emphatically as he could. He could bear it no more, he must have it out, though he rather expected Kurt or Hank or whoever else saw to his care would not be happy with him.

And, oh, by all the gods, the _fjandinn_ thing hurt as it withdrew! Loki coughed, choked, retched and would have been sick if his stomach had contained so much as a sip of water or crumb of food.

Erik gently pulled the tape from his eyelids, leaving Loki blinking in the soft grey light. He pulled the needles and tubes and sticky patches from Loki’s arms and body.

“You are very kind, Erik,” Loki tried to say. His voice came out weak, and sounded rusty. “Were you watching over me?”

“I was,” the old man said. “I knew. Don’t ask me how, but I knew.”

“So kind,” Loki murmured. “When all I ever do is hurt you. How is it possible that you do not hate me for what I’ve done?”

“ _Ja_ , well…” Erik said. He picked up a cup, and held a straw to Loki’s lips.

It wasn’t water, as Loki expected, but a sweet-tart juice. Cranberry? No, pomegranate, his absolute favourite. He drank greedily and gratefully, not needing to worry, as a mortal might, that taking nourishment, after so long an abstinence, would sicken him. Rather, it was a toe-curling pleasure.

He noticed Erik grinning at him, and smiled in return.

“I thank you, Erik. Truly thank you,” Loki said. In the midst of his pleasure and relief he felt nearly choked with emotion. Emotion so complex and varied it defied description. He did not mean to weep, yet his eyes flooded.

“Anything you ask I will do for you, dear friend. Anything you need I will give. Anything, by my sworn word.”

In answer, Erik embraced him tenderly, as a father, a true and good father, might embrace his son, as Tony embraced small Jöri and Fen.

“ _Åh, min kära dumt gud spel,_ ” he said shaking his head, “Someday I hope you’ll no longer see every act of kindness toward you as a debt that must be repaid.”

 _Do I do this thing?_ Loki wondered, then knew in his heart that he did. “I also hope for that, my friend.”

Erik pulled away a little, taking Loki’s face between his large, old, weathered hands, the palms rough against Loki’s soft skin. “You are so much better now, aren’t you, _söt kille_? So much better!”

Loki laid his hands over Eric’s hands. They were terribly stiff, and did not want to open. Erik's warmth felt soothing against their soreness. “As are you. I am most heartily sorry to have hurt you, yet…”

“Without me you could not have come home.”

They regarded one another somberly for some minutes, before Erik broke suddenly, again, into a merry, crooked grin.

“ _Vad fan, käre prins_ , what’s a little madness between friends, _ja_? I am no longer angry with you, Loki, if I ever was.”

“Were you very angry with me?” Loki asked.

“ _Åh, kanske_. Perhaps. Very much at first. Less so, later on. Mostly that you did not allow me free rein to study the tesseract on my own. It was very interesting, and you must admit, you interfered, terribly.”

“I did interfere,” Loki answered, knowing he was being teased, but only as a way to make light of events between them. “I confess it freely.”

“Here is what you don’t know, _käre prins_. There is a disease we mortals sometimes fall victim to in old age, that takes first our memories, then our whole selves away—one of the many indignities you gods are spared, it seems. I had not told your brother, or Jane or Darcy, my young friends, but before our… encounter… this disease had begun in me. And now, now it has gone, Loki. So, as I say, what’s a little madness, or indignity, in the short term, if it saved me from year after year of a far worse fate?”

Loki, shocked, scanned within the small universe of the old man’s brain, and saw where the scars had healed, were healing, making all fresh and new as the brain of a young boy. He could wander for hours there, enthralled by the beauty and intricacy he saw, but he forced himself to pull back again.

Erik’s mind was no longer a place for him, and never would be again, and he felt suddenly rather sorrowful, deeply weary—and, also, though he regretted the distraction, nearly mad himself with hunger, which he suspected was more Edwin’s doing than his own.

His stomach, to his great shame, rumbled thunderously, yet Loki could not help but laugh at himself. “My youngling is very hungry it seems, and would have it known.”

“Did somebody call for takeout?” that was Clint’s voice, dear Clint coming through the doorway of his room, and Loki found himself absolutely flooded with joy. Was he to have no control of his emotions in these days? Here he was, weeping again, like a weak child, and folded up in the archer’s powerful arms, the familiar touch of his dear friend’s mind brushing his mind gently.

“Hush there, it’ll be okay. It’ll all be okay, you’ll see.” Clint pulled away, stroking back Loki’s hair as Loki surreptitiously tried to dry his eyes on the sleeve of the ugly and ill-fitting garment-of-illness he found himself wearing which, for some reason he did not comprehend, was called a “Johnny.”

“Not quite your usual look,” Clint laughed, plucking at his tear-damp sleeve. “Don’t worry, America’s Next Top Model, I brought something better for you to wear. But first, you eat.”

“The hunger is rather distracting,” Loki confessed, attempting to maintain his decorum.

Clint produced one of those large bags-of-shopping that might be used again and again, brightly-coloured, coated in shining plastic, and emblazoned with a portrait of a chicken—a rooster, to be precise, of great splendor. The odours coming from within were mouth-watering.

“'Distracting', is that what you said?” Clint laughed. “Then how come I’m reading ‘ _Sharknado_ ’? By the way, are princes supposed to drool?”

“I am not a prince,” Loki answered, from habit—and then it struck him, that statement was now perfectly true. He was, in fact, not a prince. He was a king. King of Asgard. Yet there was nothing he wanted less.

He began to weep again as he all but inhaled the entire chicken Clint handed to him within one of Thea Ransome's containers of Tupperware. The kind archer sat beside him on the bed and rubbed Loki’s back gently.

“’I’m all at sixes and sevens,’ the bearded lady used to exclaim, back in the day.” Clint took away the chicken bones—now entirely stripped bare of meat—replacing them with a second container of mashed potatoes, nearly a quart of them, the vegetables cooked in chicken broth and rich with butter, utterly delicious in flavour. “Are you all at sixes and sevens, Loki?”

“I had forgotten that, like my dear Kurt, you lived amongst circus folk," Loki remarked. "Yours, however, were not folk of either honesty or honour, I recall."

Clint laughed aloud. "You got that right!"

"I am not a lady. Neither have I a beard.” Loki had also intended to remark, with mock hauteur, that he knew not what his friend meant by “sixes and sevens,” but that would be a lie. He did know. He knew only too well. He felt so very glad to be home again, within the shelter of his own body, yet also almost entirely at sea, a raw ball of hunger and too-present emotion, his thoughts too swift and badly muddied.

Thoughtfully, Loki spooned up a last morsel of potato. He still felt hungry (though a bit disgusted with himself for his own gluttony), but no longer mad with it. Small Edwin would allow him to think, at least for the moment.

“Where I have been,” he said at last, “Time flowed along a far different stream. I have been too long alone, known want, known terrible weariness. At the end, however, I met kind people and--best of any news I might relate--the Allfather, never my father, is dead. My joy in this is great, yet also my sorrow. Confusion seems to reign within my mind, and my heart requires such healing as I cannot express, my friends.”

Loki glanced from Erik’s kind blue eyes, to Clint’s. “Thank you, dear ones,” he said softly. “And a thousand thanks again.”

“And now you need your family,” Clint said firmly. “C’mon, let’s get you into some normal p.j.’s and back upstairs. You don’t need to spend any more time in this crappy place.”

They both helped him to dress, help Loki felt no shame in accepting. Rather, he felt like a knight preparing to do battle, carefully armed by his squires. He felt joy and delight, weariness and anticipation, and found himself shaking both with physical weakness and with the onslaught of great emotion that returned again and again.

He could not walk, could scarcely stand on his own, so weakened was his body by deprivation and his long absence.

Erik and Clint, his friends, supported him however, into one of the infirmary's wheeled chairs, Clint seeming to take delight in wheeling him down the corridor to the lift at great speed, making noises as of screeching traffic, which Loki found simultaneously endearing and mildly annoying to his over-taut nerves.

Inside the lift, Clint swiftly related the full tale of the penthouse fire and his family’s subsequent relocation to that same floor of the tower where Thor dwelt. Clint become quiet when they reached that level, turning down that corridor which contained Thor's flat. The flat Tony had taken for their family, lay just across the way.

"Will you push me unto the door of our bedchamber?" Loki asked. "There and no further?"

Erik squeezed his shoulder comfortingly.

Clint gave his other shoulder a pat. "You're calling the shots, boss. You're sure you can make it?"

"I can," Loki answered simply. "I shall."

Clint, utterly silent, rolled him to a featureless white door, the door of the chamber he would share with his husband until their home had been made complete again. The place held no memories, was not theirs except in the vaguest of ways, and would not have felt homelike in the least, if not that Loki felt his children sleeping: his dear, brave Hela, his boys piled up together in a single bed. Three boys now, his two small younglings along with his much-loved Sleip. And, on the other side of this flimsy door his dearest, dearest Tony, the heart of his heart.

“Now I must bid you good night, my dear friends,” Loki said softly, not wishing to wake his husband just yet. They left him with kind, whispered words and warm embraces, understanding well his need.

He struggled again to stand, with his friends' aid, yet already that task had become easier than it had seemed downstairs, in the soulless infirmary.

He scarcely heard the other men bid him "goodnight."

His hand was on the knob, the knob turning, the plain door swinging open silently.

Loki stumbled to the bed on legs that felt lifeless as sticks of wood. He shivered both with a sudden chill, and with the greatness of his feeling.

Tony lay flat on his belly, snoring in a low, rumbling way, his limbs spread out to the four corners of the bed.

 _Oh, my Tony,_ Loki thought, _Oh, my husband, my dearest one, how greatly and terribly I have missed you. Lie beside me now, and hold me, and I am then entirely home and complete._

He stood a moment, committing the image to memory: Tony's rumpled hair, the smooth skin of his back, the disgracefully shabby plaid boxers, which were all he wore.

"Husband, scooch over,” Loki said, scarcely trusting his own voice. He put a lightness in his tone, so as not to spook his husband as one might sometimes, inadvertently, spook a high-bred and high-strung horse.

“I am quite frozen, and inordinately weary. And besides that, _hjarta hjarta minn_ , I would like this night to lie with you after being so long away.”

His Tony, still entirely asleep and deep in his dreams, rolled to his side, opened his arms, and welcomed Loki home again, smiling in his unconscious state, as if even in the Dreamworld he knew what was happening.

Loki went to him, lay with him, was encircled by those same firm arms, surrounded by his husband's warmth.

He pressed his cheek, then, to Tony's chest, against the slow, steady beat of Tony's heart, and felt welcomed, comforted, altogether home, even within this strange bed, this unfamiliar flat. Then as he lay there, encircled in love, encircled in peaceful stillness, it seemed he saw through the walls of the tower with the eyes of his consciousness, as if the great, high walls had become made of glass--and beyond, to the vast city around them, to this country, to this fascinating and barely-glimpsed world he now lived in.

 _I will love you, my Midgard_ , Loki vowed. _I will love you and protect you ever after. If it lies within my power, you will come to no harm._

He wriggled up a little in the bed, brushing his lips against Tony's lips, then kissing his brow tenderly. Tony's hair smelled slightly unpleasant, which was not usual. He had clearly been neglecting himself, and that must end.

"Tony. My Tony," Loki slipped his arms around his husband, holding him closely in return, slipping then, gently, into dreams of his own, in joy greater than any he had ever known.

 

The End  
To be continued in <em>Avenger</em>


End file.
